


strange seas are for stronger swimmers

by paintedviolet



Category: Doctor Who, Doctor Who (2005)
Genre: Angst, F/F, Human!Doctor, Human!thirteen, Introspection, M/M, Sheffield As A Lure For Alien Activity, Slow Burn, Team Bonding, also i love my ocs, and graham is a sweetheart, human nature au, i need it out so i don't go mad with it, jane is an awkward disaster, like very slow, more characters to be tagged - Freeform, plot properly starts in like chapter eleven, ryan is trying to live a normal life, surprise (but not really) cameos (eventually), this has been in my head for ELEVEN months, yaz is guilt-ridden
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-10-26
Updated: 2019-12-29
Packaged: 2021-01-03 17:28:24
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 10
Words: 67,790
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21183224
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/paintedviolet/pseuds/paintedviolet
Summary: 'She swears she’s never seen the Doctor so distressed. Not even at New Year. Her soft face, her button features crowned in a deep despair, words just on the tip of her tongue in that last moment. When it was just the two of them. When their comfort was ripped from underneath their feet.That last hug ended far too quickly. Yaz wanted to squeeze so hard the Doctor became part of her, under her protection. And how strange that was – to be the protector instead of the Doctor’s charge.She knew she couldn’t, so she committed to memory the feel of the Doctor’s body against hers; the warmth of her torso, the rush of the Doctor’s inhale, exhale, the rapid four-beat rhythm.'The world is in danger and the Doctor is nowhere to be seen. Left behind, Yaz, Ryan and Graham have been given only one task: find Jane Smith, and keep her safe.





	1. one: no remedy

**Author's Note:**

> Well, this is a long time coming.
> 
> I first got the idea for this fic on December 16th 2018, when [this gifset](https://nooowestayandgetcaught.tumblr.com/post/180569323022/she-remembers-what-the-doctor-told-her-its) from [nooowestayandgetcaught](https://nooowestayandgetcaught.tumblr.com/) stormed into my room and punched me in the face. I swear, I’ve never had such a strong reaction, such a strong need to write. So, loosely based on the gifset, I’ve been planning, writing, forming an entire universe in my head to explore the feelings and dynamics of these characters I dearly love. For about eleven months.
> 
> Originally, I was going to write this all out and then post, but with S12 filming wrapped up, I think the time to post it is now, in the buildup for the new season. As such, four chapters of hopefully twenty/thirty (?) have been written, so I’ll set a schedule to upload on **Saturdays, 2pm**.
> 
> I’ll be uploading this on Wattpad, too, so if you prefer to read on there, you won’t miss out.
> 
> One of the most important things is that [I already have a tumblr blog specifically for this fanfiction.](https://strange-seas-fanfic.tumblr.com/) This will be expanding along with the amount of content I upload, so the universe in which the fic is set can come alive. I’ll be particularly interested in posting aesthetics and music related to the events written in the fanfiction. If you have a question or want to discuss the fic, please drop me an ask! I’d love to discuss it with you.
> 
> I also have made a [playlist on Spotify](https://open.spotify.com/playlist/6kZkcpw9k3B4F1yR4x94Xy?si=B2hpMO4ER4WRICX77XIOaQ) which I use while I’m writing the fic. I’ll be adding songs onto it constantly, as well as recommending music in the notes on AO3, so please give that a follow and check it out whenever.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _how long will i blame it on a past life tragedy?_
> 
> _there's no remedy_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> for this chapter i'd recommend the gorgeous ['wide eyed' by billy lockett](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NFyOt__GxF0).  
thank you so much to [ koraliss](https://archiveofourown.org/users/lieutenantsaavik) for being my wonderful beta, this fic simply would not be what it is without her. please give her all the love she deserves!
> 
> i now have faceclaims for yaz's colleagues, so please head over to the [character page on the fic blog](https://strange-seas-fanfic.tumblr.com/characters) to have a look!

Echoes of the day ahead are already beginning to reach her ears by the time she pulls up to work. The sun isn’t even stretching yet; winter is too much to bear in the mornings, and she’s too deep into a slumber to shed any light. They will have to wait before the hard work of the day can be illuminated.

She can hear it, Yaz supposes: the six in the morning stumble. Most people aren’t even awake. Amongst them, a different breed; the chosen few are switching on lights, or TVs. Making cereal in half-dressed states. Checking the aisles of their corner shops, adjusting their uniforms for the first heavy-footed customers to come shuffling in.

Sirens blare and cars hum in traceable distance; the traffic is never-ending, but it settled into a lull a good few hours ago. It will pick up again soon, but for now the roads are free and easy under cover of lightless morning. Vehicles whirr their well-wishes.

Sheffield is starting up again.

Yaz is early, by virtue of it. She tends to be, especially for the morning shift. For the price of a few minutes under covers, she gets to pause and peruse in the car, something she’s much better at wide awake than when captured by the haze of deep sleep. Sometimes she plans, makes blueprints of ways to pester – and unwillingly frustrate – her superior. Quite often it’s self-reflection; a quick prayer, and a gathering of strength.

This morning it’s none of these.

For most of the journey, her car has been hidden by the cover of the sunless February morning. The silver paint of the vehicle looks dark and dull, invisible even, before dawn; like Yaz is a ghost only mirroring the world around her. In the car park, the warm lighting through the windows of the police station has thrown it into full exposure. The front becomes illuminated – a glaring anomaly.

Her clothes are black without the fluorescent jackets she’s yet to don; her puffed coat is to be thrown into a locker. For now, it’s necessary warmth as she sits on the hood of her car.

The black bags under her eyes visible for all to see. But Yaz is not thinking of that. She’s not hearing the six in the morning stumble; or feeling, really, the chill of the night’s frost tracing the outlines of her face. In her hands, she grips a metal device, an otherworldly contraption, and her hold is tight.

When she presses down the button, the instant buzzing is louder than anything else Yaz can hear. Brilliant orange light she is already learning to miss becomes reflected in sharp light across the car hood. Otherworldly. The mist of breath curls away from her, running out of fuel, before she lifts her thumb-tip from the button – and she breathes again.

The buzzing is silenced. The light vanishes.

All that’s left is grounded.

There’s no sense of shame, but remorse coils inside her like a spring, the subtle ache of knowing better becoming a new friend for her dread. It’s enough to straighten her spine, to slide off the car hood and stalk round to open the passenger door. The sonic is lobbed in with the rest of her paraphernalia in the glovebox compartment and locked inside. She has to get to her job.

The screwdriver can’t be useful now. Not while they’re stuck like this, she thinks.

All that’s left is grounded.

* * *

She’s early, by virtue of it. She gets a few minutes alone in the storage room, too, away from the thought of her supervisor ignoring her, away from the tired eyes of her colleagues desperate to go home; away from what she’ll have to struggle through today.

Not helped by her lack of sleep.

She’s keeping her coat on for now. This dingy storage room feels like a vacuum, like its emptiness is somehow too big to cope with. She’s felt that before, looking up into the night, being part of it, but somehow that was easier to deal with. There’s one light overhead and it’s flickering, again. At her locker, she closes her eyes and rests her head on the blue metal, the contact sounding a lot louder, a lot more echoey, than is strictly necessary.

She sighs.

She feels too heavy to deal with everything today. A sleepless night wasn’t long enough to process all that happened – to replay the day’s events in her head, over and over again, in painstaking slow motion, to see the Doctor look so crestfallen, so scared, to feel the panic pulsing through her, to feel the dread coming off the Doctor in _ waves _when they hugged for the last time—

God, grant her the strength.

Hands slam on the locker next to Yaz, then opens it, the sharp _ bang _reverberating throughout the austere room – she jumps almost out of her skin.

‘—was awake,’ she mumbles, and she hears a laugh. Then the speech starts.

‘Can you believe I got cat-called at six-bloody-am in the morning? In my car. Man in a white van. At six in the bloody morning. Unbelievable.’

Yaz has startled back to life enough for her to take off her coat, instantly regretting it when the chill in the room crashes onto her exposed skin. Suppressing a shiver, she sends Maisie a look of sympathy.

Eyes forward and focused, her furrowed, heavy brow accentuated by her thick, heavy eyebrows, Maisie may as well be condemning the catcaller to death by sheer expression alone. The way she stuffs her jacket into her own locker does nothing to dispel this. Yaz is maybe just a little scared of her work friend.

‘Ouch,’ she offers.

Maisie is too busy piling the rest of her belongings into her locker to notice Yaz’s slow response. ‘He told me to wind the window down. Thought he was telling me I was doing something wrong with my driving, you know, like normal people do when you’ve got your hazards on or something. And you know, it’s six in the fucking morning, I look like death, I feel like death – yeah, I could have my hazards on. Then he starts asking me on a date – and I’m like, what the fuck. I’ve got no makeup on so I look like I’ve just killed someone, I’m late to start my shift, and this wanker has the nerve to ask me out _ at the traffic lights_. Literally, what the fuck!’

‘What did you say?’ Yaz asks. Now her hands are free, she shuts her locker.

Maisie’s locker slams shut not long after; finally, she looks to her left at Yaz. The pure disgust on her face melts into an emotion no less severe. She grins, her mouth wide on her small, square face, and despite her tiredness, her eyes sparkle.

‘I looked him dead in the eyes, put my best bitch face on, and I told him, “Mate, I’m a fucking police officer”,’ she recalls. Victory, for Maisie, makes the sweetest sound – her giggle echoes around the storage room. ‘Oh, my God, Yaz, you should’ve seen his face. His life flashed before his eyes.’

The thought makes Yaz chuckle – a bit of schadenfreude never hurt. She lets this burst of positive energy take her over to where the police jackets wait for them. Navigating the stiff casing is difficult when her exhaustion is returning with a vengeance. Maisie follows. ‘Good riddance,’ Yaz says. She shakes her head in wonder. ‘Six in the morning.’

‘Patriarchy’s an early bird, apparently,’ Maisie replies, shrugging into her jacket. ‘Anyway, are the other two here yet?’

The door to the storage room is deathly quiet – a stark contrast to the aged contents of the room – so it doesn’t betray the guys’ arrival. Their voices do instead: a conversation about a film seen together last night reaches the girls’ ears.

‘...felt unnecessary; like, the films were alright on their own.’

‘Yeah, just a money-grab I reckon. Lot of ‘em are, nowadays.’ The door closes behind him, soundless.

Maisie sighs, an overexaggerated _ humph _made louder by the exposed materials of the room’s décor. ‘And to think we were nearly rid of you,’ she groans.

Tomasz’s head snaps to where Maisie rests against her locker, and his early morning frown relaxes into his trademark easy smile. ‘Gonna have to try harder than that, you know.’

‘Unfortunately,’ Maisie grins back.

The early shift gets to them all – Tomasz the most – so the boys take their time in getting ready. There’s no harm in it, though the minute drags in this room. Instead of heading out, like she often does, Yaz stays and waits for the three of them, scooting out of the way so her friends can put on their police jackets.

Flying off into space has made a mess of her awareness of the world. Time marches on solidly for everyone else in the room; for her, it comes in chunks, sped up and slowed down, choppy like the sea. Keeping afloat when surfacing, then, is the hardest part. She’s had to learn, quickly, that listening is the best way to anchor herself to the time period. The more she talks, the more she gives herself away.

If she really racks her brain, she remembers the lads talking about a cinema outing. She’d declined, on the basis of seeing her family after so long in the TARDIS. Not that she’d told them that. She was still too-serious Yaz, too married to the job to consider anything else.

She almost laughs to herself. How things change.

The feeling develops in her chest, like a stubborn piece of food; twisted the wrong way and stuck there. It doesn’t feel right, this bitterness. Of course, it’s something she’s familiar with: a feeling that imprisoned her in her worst moments at school; a feeling she feels a flash of when a certain type of person takes offence to her certain type of person. But she’s never felt it about her travels with the Doctor before, and it scares her.

It scares her that she’s managed to get so scared. How she got so used to that life.

She clears her throat. She can’t do this to herself.

‘You alright, Yaz? You look dead tired,’ Tan says. He’s contorting his torso to get into his police jacket, and his voice moves around with it. When it’s on, he pats it down, and runs his hand over his fine black hair to make sure it’s impeccable. It shines under the swinging light overhead.

‘Ta very much,’ is her indignant reply, though it comes after stifling a yawn. She can’t look at him properly.

‘You know what I mean,’ he half-laughs – and she does. Tan is one of the nicest people she’s ever met. His laugh is a soft sound, and his question, ‘Bad night?’ is even gentler.

She nods, more to the floor than to her friend. Any other morning, she might’ve told him about it – but no, even that’s defunct now.

Sonya’s favourite tease, Yaz’s supposed friendlessness, is only half-baked in truth. In the worst moments on the job, she’s had these three to fall back on – people who understand her if only because of the job they share. In truth, she’s nothing like them, and they’re nothing like each other, but there’s a bond between them only service officers can understand.

In past times, she could call on them for help – and they, especially, on her. But finding the Doctor has changed her life forever. Some of her most treasured moments are some of her most unspeakable ones. They create a gulf between her and her friends. However she tries to cross it, she always fall short of the shore.

Of course, the girls stick together usually, and the boys prefer each other too, but quite often it’s Tan’s shift that overlaps with hers. And lovely Tan, the gentlest man on the force, is the one she’d go to in the quiet moments. Sifting through case notes and reports, her desk next to his, she’d stretch and roll back on her chair, and then he’d turn to her. Quiet talk, permissible unless distracting, got them through the slog. Somehow he’d always have a funny anecdote about his day so far, often a conversation between him and Mrs Wu, his mother beloved by most of the force, or about something seen on the job. If the other was struggling, they’d get through it together.

Distracted by her adventures, a timeless girl fitting into solidity, Yaz has let that fall away in recent months. Her closeness with Tan has started to slip away.

She looks up and catches his eye. Kind eyes are on her and he smiles a half-smile. The bags under his eyes are deep, too.

Yaz gives him an empathetic pat on the back as they make their way into the main meeting room.

* * *

Often it’s unlikely that they all have their shifts at this time in the morning – a busy city like Sheffield supplies a healthy population of police officers – so Sergeant Sunder is not at all expecting all four of them to report for duty. He’s deep in conversation with his own superior, DSI Mark Stevens. Recognisable by his thick brow, big, hooked nose and his jowl-enhanced frown, the DSI is a regular sight around the building. Often his shuffle will announce his bad-tempered arrival, and shoulders around the office hunch with fear in a Pavlovian effect.

The four of them have put themselves on guard without thought. Yaz sees the straight lines for mouths and wonders what it must be like to be a man like that. Stubbornness and a whiff of unpleasantness, all tolerated for the sake of a good track record.

This time, it seems, he’s taken issue to a broken kettle in the ground floor kitchen. ‘That damned thing’s broken before, you know, and now I’m coffee-less,’ they hear him growl to their supervisor. Why he’s decided Sunder is the man for the job is quite the mystery – one even the Sergeant hasn’t yet cracked. But it’s one Sunder isn’t likely to object to. 

Maisie discreetly rolls her eyes to Yaz. Any other day, perhaps, and Yaz would’ve chuckled under her breath. As it is, she’s struggling to keep her eyes open. The barest hint of a smile plays on her lips, and it’s good enough. She keeps her head forward, trained on the Sergeant, to dispel any risk of being caught. Next to her, Tomasz leans against the doorframe and runs a palm over his pale face. Tan squints up at the bright glow of the overhead light, exacerbating the intense beige of the drafty meeting room before them.

Sunder finally notices them loitering about in the doorway, and the anguish of a man trapped in an exceedingly boring conversation dissipates into relief. A final nod, a parting sentence, and he wraps up the conversation with DSI Stevens with a promise that he’ll get a maintenance guy to look at the electrics on the kettle.

DSI Stevens must be a busy man, Yaz thinks, and yet. Moaning to Sunder about a kettle. Still, an acknowledged superiority is not enough to keep him in the room. His exit is silent, but swift. He doesn’t even look at the four probationary officers as he storms through the doorway, not even to thank them for parting to let him pass.

Yaz throws her head back to avoid yawning straight at her supervisor but catches Stevens’ eye in the process. He’s looked back, just the once, at the four of them, as if trying to figure something out. There’s none of the usual irritation found in his deep-set eyes. But he doesn’t return.

‘The Fantastic Four!’ Sunder crows with faux delight. The nickname is of his own making, almost a badge of honour for the four probationary police officers have earned during their time here. Unsurprisingly, their actual jobs are far less exciting than the nickname implies.

The Sergeant uncrosses his arms, stretches his joints. He’s not an animated person, by any means, but some life seems to have seeped back into him now the DSI has disappeared. ‘How on Earth are you all on shift at the same time?’ He shakes his head. ‘Absolute madness. Naheem needs to be sacked. Come in, come in.’

They file in, one by one, stepping from hardwood floor to beige carpet as the meeting room greets them. The desks in here are arranged into a long rectangle, with each side flanked by one or two whiteboards on each of the stark white walls. Every single one of the whiteboards has been filled in with barely legible writing, the sight worsened by Yaz’s exhaustion. She concentrates just enough to decipher them: data collected on different demographics within Sheffield; a force-wide plan for the next few years; details about another budget cut. At the far end of the room, where Sunder waits, stands a podium with a computer, and a projector hangs down from the ceiling.

Remembering his supervisory role, he makes his way over to the podium to log into the computer. They’re simply made to wait in the meantime, counting the seconds announced by the clock’s persistence.

Tomasz, true to nature, parks his bum on the nearest desk available and crosses his arms. His face contracts, almost painfully, before Yaz realises he’s trying to hold back a yawn.

Tan stays standing, and Maisie copies, leaning heavily on her right leg.

Yaz breaks trend by collapsing onto one of the chairs, gorgeously plush and comforting to her sleep-deprived bones.

Yaz stifles the yawn she catches from Tomasz, and Maisie squeezes her shoulder.

She shouldn’t feel this tired. It’s like she’s forty, not twenty.

She makes the decision to lay her head on the table and immediately revels in the feeling. Closing her eyes feels even better.

‘You in the Health and Safety class at nine?’ Tomasz asks Tan, merely a voice floating into Yaz’s ears. She doesn’t need to see his face to feel his dread – the content is nothing any of them haven’t heard before.

‘Not at nine, no,’ his friend says, after a little consideration. ‘Sorry, mate.’

Tomasz tuts in disappointment, and Yaz sympathises. It’s difficult going it alone.

The intranet must be up and running again, because it takes much less time for the Sergeant to access their timetables than usual. Today he only gets through half of his favourite whistle tune – when it stops, Yaz’s head snaps up from the table and she straightens her spine. She’s awake. She’s awake. She’s awake.

Sunder sighs, and nearabout pushes all the oxygen out of the room. ‘Mazurek, you’re in Health and Safety at eight, not nine,’ he corrects.

Tomasz does his best to contain his groan. It’s not very successful.

‘Wu, your simulation starts at seven-thirty. Car crash, I believe. Report to Suzie—uh, PC Guter for that one.’ Switching his attention from the computer to Tan, he adds, ‘_ Please _ tell me you know where you’re going, ‘cause you know I can’t be arsed to go through that again.’

Tan nods eagerly. ‘Yes, sir.’

‘Williamson—’ Maisie looks up suddenly, stops picking at her nails ‘—and Khan, you’re on patrol. Maisie, I want you on foot, so report to PC Lucas. Yasmin, you’re driving. City centre and south, alright?’

Yaz closes her eyes for a brief moment, biting back the urge to groan too. Patrol, again. Is there seriously nothing else to give her? She should have expected this. No chance to lose herself in everyone else’s days. Thoughts of Tomasz trying to stay awake through a Health and Safety class will only take her so far. After that – reality.

And that’s just too much to deal with right now. She’s awake now, but not for the right reasons.

Yaz resists the urge to fold in on herself. She takes a deep breath and starts to protest. ‘Sir—’

‘Don’t, Yasmin.’ He won’t even look up at her – he’s too busy typing. ‘I’ve got a meeting in five; I don’t need you badgering me beforehand.’

It stings, but it no longer stings enough to stop her. She needs a distraction more than she needs her pride. ‘But surely—’ she tries again.

‘No,’ Sunder cuts her off. He rubs away the tiredness in his eyes and sighs. ‘I’ll radio you if there’s something weird, obviously.’ Tomasz laughs. ‘Now get lost, all of you!’

* * *

Roads snake round and intertwine, lazy bends that accentuate the slow dawn. The car takes her there instead of the opposite; gears shift to accommodate for Sheffield’s hills and plateaus. Buildings are still asleep as she drives past, dull and dark without the sun to shine on their heritage. Clothed in black, they keep safe the contents inside – offices, kebab shops, high street shops. Their glass shop fronts illuminate as the cars speed past, putting on show their lifeless insides against their will. Restaurant seats are waiting patiently for their customers. Clothed mannequins stare coldly out at the street in front of them, frozen stock-still, their mockery of humankind built into their very being. The clean white walls and floors of the shops to which they are tethered give them no comfort; they are condemned to watching life play out before them, never to take part in it themselves.

(When she was little, Yaz had a dream that they came alive. She’s never trusted them since.)

Some lights are on at this time of day now. Sheffield’s Wetherspoons have opened for business and the warm, deep colours of their furnishings are like open arms. Dark wood floors, burnished crimson and golden lighting all extend their greetings into the street; a few wanderers bluster in for cheap sustenance. The bars are cleared of their usual glass collections, and as Yaz whizzes by she catches a glance of a bartender cleaning, quite without hope, the permanently sticky wood on which he rests his bare arms.

Traffic is picking up now the early commuters are starting their journey, so Yaz keeps a lookout for their stops and starts. She has a job to do, and the reputation of the force to uphold. Even if the radio is silent; jobless. Even if her mind is everywhere but.

She drives around the city centre with tears blurring her sight.

Given half the chance to think about it and it breaks her down, again. Never mind the fact that she’s done this all before. But this is a fresh wound still oozing, still tender around the edges. When her fingers come to rest around the damage, the pain comes in daggers.

She is still in shock. They all are.

In the dispatch car park, Yaz sits in her patrol car and cries. Away from her friends, away from the people who would never understand, her fear is realised, condemned the moment Sunder dismissed her protests – again. No escaping from reality now; no escaping her abandonment.

The lights of the police station sweep her into full view. If Maisie and Liam patrol from here, they would see this exposed breakdown, wondered what on Earth was going on. But no one comes. Yaz is alone.

Loss is a many-pronged thing, each tip needle-point sharp and barbed. It digs into her skin in the quiet moments. In bed and grasping the duvet for precious-sought reconciliation. In the patrol car, facing the world on her own.

No answers are offered. All she has are questions.

The one person in the whole universe who could have calmed her queries is the one person not around to hear them.

It’s a funny thing, losing someone and not losing them all the same. The promise of a return a distant hope at this point in time, at the starting line. She wonders if it’ll ever get better, or if she’ll be doomed to empty nights and even emptier days. Waiting for the partner to come back for a war, stationed at the window for the rest of her life.

And so the barbs prick her skin.

She wipes the tears from her face and kicked her car into gear, but they fall again anyway. A stubborn line for a frown, her jaw set and head high despite the blur tears beget.

Yaz prays for the strength to wipe them away, to breathe in and settle the trembling in her chest.

Few people flaunt their illicit activities on the streets, especially in the winter. Criminals prefer the cover of darkness, that much is true, but most prefer the cover of duvets more. When the air becomes cold to the touch, every step an effort to keep warm, illegal behaviour is best sought indoors, near a heater or a fire. Yaz can’t say she blames them.

Early mornings are usually mundane, the incidents few and far between. The patrol car hugs the tarmac as long as it can, combustion harder to come by until the heat hits its stride and the warm air flows through the cockpit once more. But there are times when Yaz has to park the car and answer to the road – when she’s taken away from bitter reminiscence about their last words, about their last gazes.

(She swears she’s never seen the Doctor so distressed. Not even at New Year. Her soft face, her button features crowned in a deep despair, words just on the tip of her tongue in that last moment. When it was just the two of them. When their comfort was ripped from underneath their feet.

That last hug ended far too quickly. Yaz wanted to squeeze so hard the Doctor became part of her, under her protection. And how strange that was – to be the protector instead of the Doctor’s charge.

She knew she couldn’t, so she committed to memory the feel of the Doctor’s body against hers; the warmth of her torso, the rush of the Doctor’s inhale, exhale, the rapid four-beat rhythm.)

Tears well up, encouraged by the twang of pain that escapes from deep within her chest, and Yaz drops her head on the steering wheel.

Not now. _ Not now. _

She lifts her head.

Her first incident of the day is a little unusual. She frowns as she turns the car onto the street, the buzz of adrenaline already starting to take over when she realises this is something she’s equipped to deal with: a heated argument between two middle-aged men outside what she presumes is their home. The light from the doorway lights up their predicament. Feet planted squarely on the pavement, both men with their hands raised, their voices ringing across the street. Yaz parks halfway down and takes ten seconds to make the uphill journey – she can hear them as clear as day on her way over. She’s partly relieved to hear they’re arguing in Punjabi, though it’s a small bonus in a sea of tension. Her heart is pounding. She’s wide awake now.

‘Oi!’ she shouts, and at least one of them, the one in deep red cloth, has the good sense to notice her arrival. The other man in dark grey doesn’t break his stride, just concentrates on him, grabbing his jaw to keep his head staring straight ahead into his aggressor’s eyes. She tries again – ‘Sir, let go of him!’

Both men are equally sized and, upon closer inspection, look alike. Their jaws are sharp and pointed in the same way, their noses thin too, but the man in the clutches of the other one is significantly smaller, maybe younger. Brothers, Yaz thinks. Seems likely. Family disputes are always intense. The first man seems to be faltering in his confidence now Yaz is here; the second is clearly taking advantage of it. Yaz’s Punjabi is advanced but she’s not entirely fluent; the sentences she hears are almost complete. She can fill in the gaps, however. She jogs her last few steps.

‘Excuse me, I told you to stand down,’ she says firmly to the aggressive man, attempting to put her body in between them. She honestly hopes the red around her eyes has calmed down enough.

He does let go of his brother, but with a shove that sends the man stumbling back. Yaz steps forward, then, putting herself in front and blocking both men.

She twists to the side to look at the first man. ‘Are you alright there, sir?’

‘Fine,’ he shoots back in English, rubbing gingerly at his jaw. ‘It’s just him. He’s a madman. He’s—'

His brother spits, ‘Rich, coming from a thief—’

‘Liar! I never—'

‘Alright!’ Yaz shouts. She turns her head back to him. ‘Would anybody like to tell me what’s going on, before you both land yourselves in jail?’

‘It’s self-defence!’ the smaller brother crows, but Yaz wants to hear from the other one first. ‘I can’t be jailed for self-defence!’ he attempts.

The man in front of her is foreboding in his anger, sharp angles made sharper by the shadow cutting through half his face, but he deflates now he no longer has his hands on his brother. Red hot heat in deep brown eyes, noticeable even in the dark of the morning, fizzles out to be replaced by a much more wounded look.

‘He’s a thief,’ he repeats. ‘My money for my daughter, university fund. He ignored what we said and still took it. Thought if he do it in the morning he could get away with it.’ He tries to get his brother back into his line of sight. ‘He’s a _ thief!_’

‘Sir, calm down.’

‘I want my money back!’

‘_Calm down_,’ Yaz responds, a harder edge to her voice this time. ‘Assault isn’t going to get your money back.’ She thrusts a hand forward to stop him from moving any closer; he bounces off it. ‘This isn’t the way to deal with it.’

Fists are unclenched now, by both of the men. This isn’t a typical street fight influenced by alcohol or drugs. She knows they don’t want any more trouble; this is far too personal to let it be followed by a trip to the cells.

It’s her job to keep the mood calm, especially now the row has attracted the rest of the house. A young child escapes the clutches of his family, only to be hauled into his mother’s arms and taken back inside. But other young women, still in their pyjamas, are glued to the doorway.

‘It’s my money, officer,’ the alleged thief protests, half-panicked, half-indignant. He rushes up behind Yaz and cradles his jaw again. ‘It’s inheritance. Officer, please. Please.’

‘Inheritance to _ me _—’

‘Sir,’ Yaz snaps, and she doesn’t look away from the older brother until he acquiesces.

Finally. She takes a moment to let the dust settle. Heaving a sigh, she steps away.

‘I can’t solve this for you two,’ she says. ‘I’m not a miracle worker. It’s your job to work it out, and if you can’t, then you take the dispute to official organisations. But in the meantime, you consult your family and any documents you may have of your inheritance, and you communicate with each other. You don’t fight at seven in the flipping morning. The sun’s not even up, for goodness sake!’ She shakes her head. ‘Did you really want to be arrested for assault before the sun’s even risen?’

The men are silent, stewing in their betrayal. They’re staring daggers at each other, but at least neither of them wants to get aggressive anymore.

It’s enough for her. ‘Good,’ she says, and nods.

An older woman in light, draping pyjamas – their mother, Yaz thinks – has stepped tentatively down the drive and padded over to reach her sons. They don’t notice her, engaged in a staring contest, but she tugs very forcefully on both their sleeves.

‘_Kamale_,’ she mumbles under her breath. ‘Both of you, inside. _ Mata’s _orders.’

The adrenaline starts to dissipate from Yaz’s insides as she finalises the procedure of the incident. When both men finally re-enter the house, the mother thanks Yaz for her involvement. It’s clearly a source of frustration to her, and with the way she frowns, Yaz picks up a little bit of shame too. She does what she can to placate and inform the old woman, but she can only do so much. They can only ever do so much.

The sound of shouting escapes the house again, and the mother is called to it. But she hangs on, looking at the red around Yaz’s eyes and then staring, deep. Her grip on Yaz’s arm, at first grateful, gets tighter. Her desire to reach out. No words are exchanged, and she leaves Yaz to grapple with the kindness she’s shown, a kindness Yaz didn’t even ask for.

Her return to the police car is a much anticipated one. She hangs around to radio in her report to her superior – Sunder is surprised to hear Yaz did anything at all, and Yaz fights the urge to bang her head against the car horn – but after that, she drives away.

Now the buzz has left her body, she doesn’t want them to see her collapse into grief again.

* * *

_ Mum (08:42): You’ve got a parcel come for you this morning putt. xx _

_ Mum (08:43): Very small and it looks like it’s from your Doctor woman. xx _

_ Mum (08:43): Did you ask her to send something? xx _

_ Yasmin (12:16): ...No I didn’t. Thank you mum _

_ Mum (12: 16): No problem xx _

_ Yasmin (12:18): Don’t open it okay? I know you’re always curious _

_ Yasmin (12:18): It’s probably private _

_ Mum (12:20): It’s always private when it comes to that woman!! Xx _

_ Yasmin (12:21): For good reason! _

_ Yasmin (12:21): xx _

_ Yaz Khan (12:22): Hi Graham, I’ve had a parcel delivered to me from the Doctor. I’m pretty sure it’s for all three of us _

_ Yaz Khan (12:22): Are you free this evening so we can open it together? _

_ Graham (12:40): Hi Yaz yes we’re free this evening Ryan will be back from garage...Would you be free from 7...Would that be enough time after your shift? _

_ Yaz Khan (12:40): 7 would be great, Graham, thank you! _

_ Graham (12:40): Thank you for letting us know...How are you holding up? _

_ Yaz Khan (12:40): That’s a question best answered in person _

_ Yazzy (12:35): Ryan _

_ Yazzy (12:36): The Doctor sent me a parcel _

_ Yazzy (12:36): I don’t know what’s in it but my mum said it’s very small. I don’t want to open it without you two _

_ Yazzy (12:36): Are you free today? _

_ Ryan (13:07): yh should be after 5 _

_ Ryan (13:07): dunno what graham’s got on but he’ll want u round _

_ Ryan (13:07): specially after last night _

_ Ryan (13:08): think he was gonna ask u to come over anyway _

_ Yazzy (13:11): I’ll be over at 7. Graham’s a better texter than you are _

_ Ryan (13:12): wounded _


	2. two: figure how to fix this

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _like a kind mirage_
> 
> _that's been playing the desert sun_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i love these three more than i can wholly articulate.
> 
> also who else is waiting for twitter user bbcdoctorwho to post something after [THAT photo](https://twitter.com/bbcdoctorwho/status/1189919997524623360?s=19) because _i've not calmed down since halloween _
> 
> [and here's a reference for yaz's room if you so desire](https://pin.it/33f7llcxi4dgxg)
> 
> for this chapter, i'd recommend the song ['ayahuasca'](https://youtu.be/qN5N4IJnTLs) by vancouver sleep clinic.
> 
> thank you again to [ koraliss](https://archiveofourown.org/users/lieutenantsaavik) for beta-ing and gently reminding me not to use so many semi-colons x

She’s finished by three.

She feels it, too; languishing at her desk, three reports complete but subject to sloppy mistakes, typed-up musings where incident reporting should have been, quickly wiped from the sentences to which they never belonged. Her eyes have been forcing themselves shut, despite her common sense and much to the delight of Maisie at the desk behind her; blurred and faltering reality letting slip references to her other life, sneaking in without permission. Only her subconscious would betray her like that. Only her subconscious would think to.

(Her heart pounding at the sight of it: _ Radioed request concerning missing Doctor_. Tractor; she means tractor. At least that one was found.)

3 p.m. can’t come quicker. Neither can a nap. A featureless drive home in Sheffield’s school traffic, roads she can drive blindfolded. Stopping and starting and groaning in frustration at the latest desperate parent to cut her off on the packed roundabout. Always that one bloody roundabout.

The drive passing quickly and not quickly enough. Her eyes dart infrequently to the glovebox. She feels it, not by touch but by knowledge. A link more physical than she ever expected. It makes her fingers dance.

Back on the estate, she fetches it out of the glovebox, stuffs it in her coat pocket and pretends not to feel it. Her home’s megastructure, modern and bright and inviting – Park Hill’s image to the masses. Treading the twice-a-day journey, she feels exposed by the white walls and the concrete. If the sonic were to light up, there’d be nowhere to hide it. She can’t glance at next-door’s flat, reanimated since their spidery adventure: a couple with a baby on the way.

Finally at home, she bats off questions about her day with a grunt and forgets to acknowledge her mum’s accusation that, ‘Having a nap won’t help you sleep at night, Yaz!’

She knows. She’ll probably be wide awake later. But she needs to not think in the hours before she meets up with Ryan and Graham. She needs to not think about how they’ll be coping. The sight of Ryan’s puppy-dog eyes springs to mind; Ryan’s frown-smile and Graham’s grandfatherly quotes of wisdom, chipper for the sake of it.

Shutting the door to her bedroom, alone. The minimal, modern feel of the flat is traded for a cosier space; the walls are lavished in an unobtrusive cream, the light carpet hidden mostly hidden by furniture and her threaded rug, one her _ nana _ used to own. On the far side of the room adjacent to the door, lies a weathered rug and, where it ends, a weathered wardrobe hidden under clothes on hangers that beg to be ironed. Yaz considers changing out of her work clothes for her nap, but she feels too cold still. Dad is a stickler with the heating. She moves instead to the chest of drawers, where the wall juts out in the middle of the room. It’s become a home for all of her knick-knacks: her beauty products, a couple of jewellery boxes, a few decorations, some of them from childhood she never bothered to throw out. Now it’s a temporary resting place for the sonic – right at home, Yaz thinks with a little effort, with her yellow theme. She smiles at the sunflowers she painted on her drawers.

Her bed is tucked in the corner of the room, a yellow headboard and sunflower-patterned bedsheets bringing to life what could have been a very ordinary bedroom. Up above her head hang orange-gold lights, silver stars stuck onto the ceiling; on the walls are posters, maps, family pictures. She’s proud of the space, proud that she was given the go-ahead by her parents after years of begging.

The front door’s slam announces Sonya’s return from college, and her loudness is the last thing Yaz needs. Somehow, Sonya immediately gets into an argument with their mum, and Yaz rolls her eyes, undetected.

Had the entire flat not had thin walls, this little space she calls hers would be perfect. But never mind that now.

Crisp duvet gets untucked and she sinks into bed, a sigh escaping her lips that came from her bones. She sinks into the white and yellow, then the black, effortlessly.

* * *

It’s a bit like grief, she half-thinks, in the midst of it. Falling further. The end feels forever.

* * *

‘You didn’t eat much of your keema,’ her mother notes.

Leaning on a fist, her elbow propped up by the car interior on the passenger side, Yaz shunts her body as far away as possible for breathing space she can't find. Mother and daughter on their respective journeys, bundled together by the misfortune of currently having one car. Yaz’s mother is driving to see her ‘girlfriends’, and her stress to be there on time buzzes in their ear drums, a mosquito trapped in the car with them, taking its time to alight on both women. Yaz’s mum is dressed to the nines, makeup applied flawlessly, cheeks burnished and eyelashes outlined. Her top, largely unspectacular save for a long, billowy sleeve covering her left arm only, is the same peachy-orange as a dress Yaz wore for a cousin’s wedding. The car clunks over potholes the council have ignored for ten years and counting; it becomes the drum beat for the timeless songs they listened to at the reception. Heady and embracing, firm as elbows hooking under her armpits, goading her up onto the dancefloor. And Yaz did dance, that night, as a little girl mingling with the other kids of the family. She held Sonya’s hand for most of it, danced with her four year old sister and looked out for her when one of the others decided it was their turn to play.

The evening is only banished by lights – streetlights, headlights, the glow of her phone on her lap. Even then it’s not enough to expel the dark; outside their shelter, forms are lost to shadow and disappearance. They can see the faces of buildings as they drive past, but the minute details, texture emboldened, fade into nothingness. In the day, the stonework here is grounding, but in the dark they are just part of another impermanent city.

‘I didn’t feel hungry,’ Yaz says. Her stomach caves in on itself.

The feel of Sonya’s tiny hand in hers. Matching dresses, peach-orange adorned with gold lining, the curl of material around legs as they hugged. She has a photo on her drawers of the two of them from that night, stood with hands entwined, encouraged to smile at their Daddy as he took the photo. It’s the one picture that Sonya will comment on every time she blusters into Yaz’s room – if only to critique how wonky her baby teeth were.

Her mother makes a turn. The closer they get, the more familiar the route becomes. The dark encroaches. Yaz is still not sure whether she’ll be happy to give this journey up. Outside of this metal box, she’ll be free to look into the night and see purpose shine back.

‘You can’t have had much food today, Yaz, not on your shift,’ her mum tuts. ‘And you know your dad wanted you to eat it.’

‘It wasn’t Dad's cooking, promise.’

‘It’s alright if it is. He needs all the help he can get.’

‘It’s not!’

‘Okay,’ Yaz’s mum says, ‘okay.’ Amber up ahead; she jumps on the brakes and the car obliges. Like the adoring dog, waiting for the next sign of the chase. The soft rumble of life beneath them.

_ Ryan (18:54): we’ve got some fish+chips if u want some _

_ Yazzy (18:54): No thanks, I’ve already eaten _

_ Ryan (18:55): more for me then lol _

Yaz gets the impression her mother is staring at her. Knowing not by touch but by feeling. That bond with another human – that mutual acknowledgement of physicality, of existing in proximity – leaps from the subconscious to the prominent, and it makes her uncomfortable. She knows how this goes.

‘Nothing’s worrying you?’

It’s spoken the way a doctor prods the body for any sign of ailment. It’s not too strong a probe; though Yaz’s mum often gets it wrong, this time it’s just enough to make sure the affected area pulsates with a gentle ache. But in looking for the source, identifying a well-worn symptom, it triggers all of Yaz’s memories to rush forward in an onslaught, and four year old Sonya’s hand gets lost in the crowd. She won’t come back for a while. That is always the way with her little sister – she’ll only be found when she wants to be.

The thought sets her alight, the thought of another runaway in her periphery, and the metal of the USB burns through its packaging to heat her legs. The rise of an urge, for an impossible trade-off, returns in another round of helplessness, so strong she feels almost compelled to do the stupidest thing she can to cancel it all out.

An accident? Or could she be excused for a moment of madness? If, in a fit of emotion, she winds down the car window and chucks the USB out of it, to be crushed under the wheels of the car on the opposite side of the road. Will it end this nightmare just beginning? Will she wake up tomorrow to see the TARDIS parked on the estate as it used to?

No. And she can’t convince herself of it, no matter how hard that desperate part of her might want to try. Practicality has only ever named one price, and it is ignorance. Even now, it is not bliss.

But look where it's got her. Dedicated daughter; police officer-in-training; defender of the Earth when Earth's first defence goes missing. The three of them there to plug in the gaps where the one person the world needs the most can no longer fill that role.

‘No,’ Yaz replies, and she tries her best to make it sound real.

* * *

Illuminated by the front house light, the two of them look like angels. Tonight, their wings would droop. Ryan hides a yawn with a hand. Graham obliges the wave Yaz’s mum sends their way as she drives off in the car, the unspoken promise from one adult to another that the charge is under their protection, despite the late hour, despite the unusual friendship that has formed in Sheffield steel, in blue wood and alien orange light.

If only she knew, Yaz thinks. Somehow spiders weren’t enough. If only Mum knew the stuff they get up to – and where Yaz stands in all of it.

They embrace right there at the door, all three of them. Hugs between the four friends are neither rare nor common; every one is gracefully given and gratefully received. Even with the Doctor gone, the comfort resumes. Swamped by the heights of the other two, she’s enveloped in a familiar warmth, a familiar fragrant laundry detergent clinging to their clothes beneath the salt-and-vinegar smell of fish and chips.

They breathe in together.

And out. Disperse. Ryan wanders off to continue picking at his chips, a hand on her arm squeezing a greeting before it disappears.

‘Let’s bring you out of the cold,’ Graham says. Closing the door barricades the draught from getting through. Though the last dregs of the evening’s chill still remain, Yaz takes off her puffy coat and hangs it on the coat rack. She buries her fists in her jumper without thought. She still wields the sonic with the cotton-cloaked fingers on her other hand, her grip tight.

Graham has no jumper on, preferring a warmer house to bothering with multiple layers. In his checked shirt and green cardigan, he looks comfortable, settled. This could be a routine stop, with the Doctor not far behind. But his smile is uneasy, buckling too quickly under the frown deep-set on his face.

'How’ve you been today?’ he asks, and he doesn’t smile, just takes in the shape of her gaze.

She doesn’t answer. There’s no point.

Graham nods and places a hand on her shoulder, squeezes.

‘How are you?’ she parrots. Coping a good deal better than her, she hopes.

Graham chuckles. ‘Confused,’ he replies, ‘but at least that ain’t changed.’ He motions to the USB still clutched in her fist, hidden from view by the bright orange of her jumper. ‘Better pray that has answers, eh?’

‘I’m not holding my breath.’ Life with the Doctor always comes with questions.

It always occurs to Yaz that Graham and Ryan’s front room looks so much more lived in than her own. Her mum has a tendency to treat every inch of their flat as if it were part of a hotel she manages, even if her husband and her kids do not: pans are placed in cupboards at the perfect angles, the hob made sparkling. Not a single carpet fibre is out of place. Not a speck of dust is allowed to fall on the pictures and decorations. Every visitor is muscled, not by force but by impression, to clean up after themselves lest it disrupt the feng shui of the flat. (Needless to say, the rubbish Yaz’s dad collected was a point of contention.)

Graham’s place feels like a submersion, not an exhibition. The openness of the living-dining room only highlights how crammed with homeliness the space inside is. The sofa accompanied by same-colour pillows, and a throw more tassle than anything else. A new wooden chair, a padded cushion for a seat comfier than its predecessor. All the paraphernalia of humans past and present, obtained sometimes without thought and always deposited only when necessary; nevertheless, it amasses over time, singular objects becoming piles, becoming feature pieces. Shelves and shelves of DVDs, music players, CDs and vinyl records; well-loved books with worn corners almost evenly divided between crime fiction and historical biographies; a coffee table with two used mugs, three newspapers stacked upon one another; a lamp squeezed to the side of the piano top, unable to make any more room for the collection of family pictures. There are a fair share of decorations, too, wood-brown and granite African-style artefacts, hangings and sculptures with simple styles or arresting patterns.

The curtains are shut but the lamps emit a warm glow here. All of them are on. Yaz gravitates to the closest one by nature, warmed by the promise of light and heat.

Over at the dining table, Ryan picks at the chips offered up by the unravelled chippy paper. A duplicate lays patiently next to Ryan’s meal: both of them proudly display a battered fish each, bathed in potato slices; the steam is still curling furiously, and when Ryan bites down on his prize, he flaps his hand about like a fish out of water. He clasps the other half of the chip, doused brown with vinegar but pristinely fluffy on the inside.

‘Careful, mate, they’re still hot,’ Graham says, a bit unhelpfully, as he passes through the open space. ‘D’you want a cuppa, Yaz?’

Yaz nods, but Graham can’t see it. ‘Yeah, please,’ she corrects herself, grinning at Ryan’s antics. Graham disappears into the kitchen. ‘Thought you were cleverer than that, mate.’

‘Ey, I’m hungry,’ is Ryan’s half-eaten reply. ‘A sandwich at the garage ain’t enough.’

Neither is a lunch at 1 p.m. and half a keema. Unable to ignore the pangs of hunger any longer, she moves over to where Ryan stands, keeping eye contact to distract him from her hands dipping onto the paper. A chip secured, a victory smile, and she moves away a little to hoard her prize. In the kitchen, a kettle's rumbling promise.

'Oi, you said you didn't want any!' Ryan complains.

'You still offered,' Yaz reasons. She breaks free of her jumper’s orange barricade and places the USB down on the table. Opening her chip up with her forefingers and thumbs, she watches the steam spiral like ghost dancers. 'So thanks.'

Ryan shrugs in his defeat. He opens his mouth to speak again when the sight of the USB catches his eye. He nods his head at it. With a mouth still chip-laden, he asks, 'Is that what the Doctor sent you?'

'Just that, yeah. Haven't looked at it, though.' She chews on the first part of her chip, swallows, not taking her gaze off the device for a second. It definitely won't jump out at her, but it's the promise of purpose – of a face – that keeps her stomach tight. 'Didn't want to do it without you two.'

'Did you sleep last night?' Ryan asks. It comes suddenly – much more suddenly than her mum's question – and it throws Yaz a little. But looking up at his face, she can detect the familiar bags under his eyes, the downturn of his lips let loose. The brightness of his clothes, a sky blue top tucked into thin blue jeans with a shock of red striped down the lining, can't distract from his sagging posture, his bleary eyes.

At least she's not in this alone. Not like earlier. Warm light and stolen chips; already, Yaz feels more at home than she has the entire day.

'Did you?' It doesn't even need to be said, but she's starting to dislike silence today.

'Nah,' he says. 'Made the garage hell.' He rubs a palm down the side of his face. In the kitchen, the kettle clicks off triumphantly. 'How many hours?'

'One,' she relays. 'At a push. But I had a nap.'

Ryan nods at that, like this makes sense; like it makes sense that they are losing sleep. Like Yaz's exhaustion is something he had come to expect, when she hadn't, she wasn't prepared.

Yaz is the one who is meant to be prepared. Every adventure she's been on, she's always been the one silently calculating exits, distances and threats. She's been reading the room since before she travelled with the Doctor. But practicality sacrifices peace of mind, and she didn’t think of what would happen – what has happened. Now the Doctor is gone, and she was not prepared.

One hour's sleep, the rest of the night spent crying, reliving horror and uncertainty and dread. Repeating in her head the utter shock and her silent pleading, begging through her eyes, that the Doctor did not take this route – surely there was a way out, another alternative, one that wasn't so drastic? One that didn't _ hurt_? Alone, wrapped in sunflowers and feeling anything but protected, wracking her brain for the alternative she so wanted – and never coming up with anything, not with a human brain so far from unearthing all of the universe. And throughout all of it, the heartbroken look, the terror and the determination, lines of trepidation etched onto that millennia-old face. Just one line repeated to her over and over again, melodic and low and sending shivers down Yaz's spine.

_ I'm sorry. I'm so sorry. There's no other way. _

Shutting the TARDIS door on her, her future scream manifesting in Yaz's head.

'Here's your tea, love,' Graham appears next to her, cradling a mug with two hands, the handle left exposed for Yaz to use. This is Yaz’s preferred mug here at Graham’s: floral, daisies and sunflowers and roses. Yaz stuffs the last half of her chip into her mouth and takes the mug gratefully, the reverence of two hands.

It occurs to her, then, just how dangerous this situation really is. Shadows hunt them, their sight obscured by the lack of knowledge of what they are; what exact threat they present to this world. All the three of them know is that the threat is strong enough to send the Doctor running. The Doctor, banished.

And here they are, taking tea. 

They sit at the dinner table. Yaz opts for the chair next to Ryan so she can pick at his chips. She won’t eat the crisp ones, so he hoards them. A couple of times, Graham replaces the deficit on Ryan’s paper with a few of his own, despite his grandson’s insistence otherwise. Aside from the resultant bickering, they eat mostly in silence. The squirt of the ketchup bottle, slathered over Ryan’s meal, comes as an upset to the stillness.

The USB rests on the placemat in front of Yaz and she doesn’t look at it; she looks at the others glancing at it instead.

Everything pinned on a USB, and what role it might prescribe them.

Every time she sees their gazes trail down, the jolt of unease upsets the consumption of her chips. Her eyes flicker instead to the mugs of tea brought through, placed in accordance to their owner. Plants; cartoon footballs, a mug acquired years ago, Ryan assures her; Graham’s beloved West Ham. Ryan and Graham’s mugs are stained with years of their use. Yaz sees the tea stains of Grace’s past enjoyments on the inside of her own mug, and she’s relieved to feel Grace's grandmotherly presence.

She catches Graham looking at it sometimes, and his smile is much the same as hers.

Everything pinned on a USB.

Yaz feels winded, all of a sudden. She takes a deep breath and the boys don’t hear it above the sound of crisp batter, biting down and continuing on.

* * *

It takes a little courage, a little drum roll, for the question to be asked. Ryan disappears up into his room for half a minute to find his laptop. Yaz preoccupies herself by helping Graham clear away any evidence of a meal enjoyed. Chippy paper in the recycling, cutlery in the sink. The kettle is popped on, a habit written into Graham’s bones, no doubt, and Yaz declines the offer of a refill with thanks. Her mug goes into the sink.

Ryan’s laptop is fast, faster than a kettle, so Yaz watches him browse Twitter at the dinner table until the water is boiled. His timeline is completely different to her own; he lives in circles she would never contact, football discussions and his mates complaining about work shifts. Memes, thoughtless political opinions, the flotsam of an entire world online. All of it seems meaningless in this moment. All of it meaning the most.

‘D’you remember the time she reformatted your phone?’ she reminisces. She moves to sit next to him, on his right, elbows up and fingers curled towards each other. She’s not meant to be looking, but Ryan’s lazy scroll keeps her attention instinctively. The bookmark bar on his browser is a cluttered mess of different thoughts, ideas worth returning to. She notices that the Twitter search for ‘alien’ is bookmarked third. ‘UFO’ is ninth, the page title reduced down to an ellipsis by the lack of space.

Ryan groans and shakes his head in despair. ‘It was brutal. You can’t even imagine. Thank God for cloud storage, eh?’

Yaz laughs. Graham returns, two mugs refilled and placed gently, and her laugh peters off.

‘You ready?’ he asks the two of them. He receives a nod from each, and it’s good enough.

Yaz does the honours, picks it up and inserts it into the side of the laptop. All resting on a USB – her mind alive with all sorts of questions, plans and purposes ready to be unearthed. The biggest question, burning her the most: _ when are you coming back to us? _

A window opens up; they peer at the single file listed – a video file, simply named ‘teamtardis.mp4’. The white space makes Yaz’s eyes hurt. No one makes a sound, or even breathes. Ryan clicks on the file and a video player opens up almost instantly; he immediately makes the player full-size.

The screengrab is of the TARDIS interior, so familiar, a comfort such a long way away; hexagons and benevolent arches, looking out for the little people below. Except the warm orange is a little deeper, a little darker, and Yaz knows it’s not the video quality. It’s too dark, too bloody an orange. The console room is flooded with it, the TARDIS’ consternation. In the background of the picture there has descended from the ceiling a contraption, a new arrival that Yaz doesn’t remember seeing. Some sort of helmet, bolts and flat pieces of metal, looking down upon them.

_ It’s the only way. _

Yaz looks down and closes her eyes, wishes the echoes of last night weren’t still ringing in her head. She doesn’t see Ryan press ‘play’ – her eyes fly open at the sound of noise emanating from the laptop.

The screengrab has jumped to life. Now part of the screen is obscured by a tube of white. It moves, and blue appears. An arm. The Doctor wheels into view on a chair obviously found somewhere in the depths of the ship.

She looks frantic, her hair a little wild, her eyes a little wilder, still a little tender. She can’t decide on any one expression. Her mouth is pressed into a thin line only to open again at a new thought. Her eyebrows furrow in half a second to smooth out again. Yaz wonders what she’s wrestling with, knowing there’d be no way to know it all. Not that she can ever find out, not now.

Her name forms on Yaz’s lips, shoulders relaxing after being tight for so long.

But Yaz won’t say it.

Shared grief is still personal. She’s almost dizzy at the sight of her friend; so familiar, so far away. The comfort just out of reach. The smell of vinegar still lingers, the silence of their meal pressing in on her. Their silence now. Hanging on the Doctor’s every motion, just like before.

Just like before. One night has passed – how is it that she’s already drenched in it? She can’t breathe.

_‘Right, we’re on,’_ the Doctor nods to herself, and it breaks through.

Yaz exhales, the smile forbidden, unbidden, on her face. Graham puts a hand on her shoulder.

_‘Hi, fam!’_ the Doctor grins to the screen – her wave so fast the video blurs it. Ryan immediately rolls his eyes at the moniker, but Yaz’s smile just widens. _‘It’s me again. I’m sorry, I know I’ve confused you all, but it’s for a good reason, I promise. I’ve not abandoned you, I swear.’_

It’s the first time the Doctor’s smile falters, a little chink of light breaking through to expose what feelings lie beneath. Yaz’s own expression immediately dampens; like clockwork.

The Doctor’s arms are clutched close to her, hands open and fingers protruding, enigmatic. This is the Doctor in explanation mode. Beforehand, they could tune out for just a moment and save themselves the confusion of being introduced to all sorts of concepts way beyond their 21st century understanding. Yaz was never one to deprive herself of it, though, and she won’t now. Not now they need it more than ever.

_‘Unfortunately I’ve had to take special measures for this particular adventure, but that doesn’t mean this is impossible! It just means that I have to rely on you three more than ever. If you really band together on this, we can sort this out, no problem.’_ Her face lights up. _‘And if it goes well, you can safely say you’ve stopped the Earth from being completely ravaged!’ _ She pauses. _‘Again.’_

The TARDIS interface bleeps at her – a matter she urgently needs to address. Yaz wants to have a look, to help out in any way she can, and it’s only a second later that she’s reminded, again, that this video has already been recorded. The Doctor is gone, and this is a temporary ghost, trapped in the expression of 1s and 0s.

_‘Yes, a passport with my new face on, surely that isn’t difficult?’_ the Doctor whines at her ship. The replying sounds are short and sharp blips, and it does nothing to dispel the disgruntled look on the Doctor’s face.

It melts away, though, with her renewed attention on the camera. She glances at it, feeling around the console in front of her for a circular object that she clasps in her hand. _‘First things first… this!’_ She holds it up and triumphantly thrusts it close to the screen; Ryan recoils slightly on instinct. When the object comes into focus, they’re surprised to discover the Doctor is holding a pocket watch. It’s perfectly round, and a little bulbous, gleaming silver in the TARDIS light with minute, detailed engravings delicately carved onto the lid.

‘Gallifreyan,’ Yaz murmurs. She can feel Graham switch his attention to her for a moment, before fixing his eyes once again on the screen, too anxious to linger.

She’s seen it before, on the screen in the console room or dotted around the spaceship as she’s wandered. Nights where she couldn’t sleep, harrowing events having carved into her subconscious, or the quiet moments in between tasks that not even a TARDIS can whisk them away from. Little pockets of Gallifreyan persist on the corridors and in the many rooms Yaz had peered into, curiosity zapping the adrenaline in her blood; little circles on incomprehensibility, a life the Doctor won’t talk about. She’s been trying for ages now to translate it, spends as much time in the TARDIS library poring over dictionaries as she does on her feet exploring with the group. All to no avail. All her efforts can’t help her now, anyway.

_‘Now this thing here is me. I mean. Inside it. Sort of. ’_ She frowns. _‘ D’you remember me telling you about a Chameleon Arch, and what it does?’_ Graham nods. So does Yaz, her mind far away enough to alight back on the previous night – the rushed semi-explanation the Doctor gave, the missing bits of information and her hurry to get them out.

_ It’s me but not me. Human biology. Chameleon Arch. _

_ I’m so sorry. There’s no other way. _

Yaz’s heart is threatening to break free, just to find the Doctor’s two hearts. One, now, she corrects herself, and the thought bleeds deeper.

_‘While I’m walking round being a totally different person _ – _ a _ human – _ this fob watch keeps the real me safe and sound, all tucked inside. I won’t know what’s happening; I’ll be too busy having a snooze. And I’m not expecting to come out for a while,’_ the Doctor continues. _‘This pocket watch can be opened by anyone, but it’s always safer if it’s the human me that opens it. Don’t let her do that unless she’s safe, and don’t let it fall into the wrong hands.’_

The Doctor clears her throat and pulls back the watch from its position. Her shuffle in the chair causes the wheels to complain against the metal floor.

_‘That’s my first rule: do _ not _ open the watch unless the coast is clear. I wouldn’t have taken these special measures if I thought there was another way out, but the Limina are a special alien race. If they know a Time Lord is on Earth, they’re not going to stop until they’ve found me. That’s why I’m lying low; pretending I’m a human, so they won’t sniff me out. Fingers crossed _ _–’_ the Doctor drops the fob watch to cross her fingers and winces at the quiet _ clang _ the watch makes_ ‘– they won’t get to Earth for a while yet, and by that time any trace of me, past or present, will have been lost in the background noise of the planet. That’s more likely to happen the longer we wait. If that happens, the Limina _ could _ move on without touching down, but comparatively that’s not very likely at all. Far more likely that they land and have a good sniff around. You’ve got to stop them from staying. _

_‘I really wish I could put a time stamp on that, but it depends on how close the Limina are. Could take from… two months up to a year.’_ She grimaces. _‘I’m really sorry about that, and I _will _ take you bowling to make up for it.’_

A year. A _ year_. Yaz feels her stomach tumble down into some undetermined depths, her throat constricting with all the thoughts she can’t bear to say. Her head pulses. A year without the Doctor.

A day to lose her; a year to adjust. Just like grief, she remembers thinking earlier, succumbing to the lull of sleep, and no, that’s not too far off at all.

‘Bloody hell,’ Graham grumbles, and Ryan pauses the video to hear what he has to say. ‘She’s gonna need to do more than bowling to make up for a year away.’

‘Exactly,’ Ryan frowns. ‘She better take us somewhere nice.’

‘Anywhere but Sheffield,’ Yaz adds unnecessarily. She only looks ahead, staring at the frozen Doctor on the screen. The sight of it dispels any sort of spell she was under, any misgivings that this was a video call, not the last communication of the Doctor before she changed, almost irrevocably, to a nameless, characterless person roaming the streets of their city. Yet, stock still, halfway through a breath, anyone might be forgiven for falling for this trick of the frame. The Doctor still looks as if she is merely held hostage by an idea – as she so often is.

Yaz wants her to continue, ‘play’ button be damned – to come alive and reassure them that everything is just their worst nightmare, and none of it is real. She’d go back on the day, un-living the chips, the brothers’ fight, the reunion with her police mates, just to see a still-functioning Doctor with her latest brilliant idea.

Ryan takes a big gulp of his tea and places the mug down, a little too forcefully, on the table. His other hand simultaneously hovers the mouse button over the ‘play’ button and he taps on it.

The Doctor whirrs back into life._ ‘Second rule: you need to stick with me. Me but not me, sorry. The TARDIS has created a story for the human me – and right now, she believes it with every fibre of her being. All I know is that her name is Jane Smith and that she lives somewhere in Sheffield. Everything else about her, I’ve handed over to the TARDIS.’_ A memory strikes the Doctor suddenly and, disgruntled, her face contracts in what Ryan fondly calls a ‘scronch’. _‘I really hope she doesn’t make Jane like pears. That happened with John and I do _ not _ like the memory.’_

Ryan blinks. ‘John?’ he and Graham say in unison.

But Yaz knows this is something the Doctor has done before – with another face, a previous one to the white-haired Scotsman. Another detail she was hungry for, hearing the clock echo in her head as their private conversation progressed. Their time alone was so short.

Yaz doesn’t say any of this. All of a sudden, it feels precious. Cradling it in her conscience, the last words spoken taking on a new sort of reverence.

It’s not theirs to know.

_‘Anyway. You need to find Jane, and you need to befriend her. Jane. Firstly,’_ she continues, waving her watch about, _‘she has this, and I’ve got a perception filter on it so Jane won’t feel any need to open it. To her, it’s just a watch. Obviously to you, it’s not, but don’t give it any more attention than necessary. If she opens it before the time is right, and I come back, then we'll have a much bigger problem on our hands.’_

‘Any of you writing this down?’ Graham wonders. The video plays on.

Too embedded to disrupt it further, Yaz and Ryan share a glance, and both shake their heads. But Ryan reconsiders and shrugs. ‘We got a rewind button though, Granddad.’

‘Despite what you might think, I do know how to operate a video player, thanks,’ chastises Graham. ‘Been watching videos since before you were born, mate.’

Ryan rolls his eyes, rewinding and finding the correct position with a few taps on the keyboard.

The rewinding is silent, but the Doctor leaps into action again as soon as Ryan presses play. _‘Oh, and secondly, she needs to have someone keep an eye on her in case my plan doesn’t work and the Limina get too suspicious. Even if she’s super annoying, please, please stick with her,’_ she goes on.

_‘Rule D: don’t find the TARDIS. I had to get the TARDIS away from you while I’m making plans, just in case the Limina suddenly get clever, so it won’t be where I dropped you off. It will, however, be somewhere near. After I finish all my preparation, I’ll programme her to be stuck in a time loop. A bit like what happened on Desolation, d’you remember? A bit like that. She won’t be able to touch down for very long, and she won’t stay without being stabilised. It’s keeping her safe from the Limina until I get back and sort her out. Believe me, it’ll be like Christmas for them if they get their hands on a TARDIS! _

_ ‘__Rule Five: d’you remember me telling you about possibility energy? About how it’s to do with your futures? I’m not quite sure why – it’s something Time Lords never fully got around to figuring out – but the more people you connect with, the more people are connected to my possibility energy. And right now, that’s the last thing anyone needs._’ She takes a deep breath. _ ‘You need to limit my connections to people in your world. Your family, your friends; the less they interact with Jane, the better. Because you three were in the TARDIS when the Limina first caught wind of me, they’re already aware of you. If that weren’t the case, I’d be keeping you in the dark too. So that’s your other job – don’t just keep Jane safe. Keep yourselves and your loved ones safe too.’_

The cloister bell gongs, a reverberating, cavity-deep sound that translates even through the laptop speakers. The Doctor’s head immediately snaps up to a place above the camera, and her mouth presses into a thin, firm line. She faces the camera again. ‘_I’m doing all I can to reduce the likelihood of the Limina arriving, but if I don’t hide soon, the Limina will find us sooner than I’d like. The more time I spend preparing, the less time it’s gonna take for them to retrace our path. So the rest of the damage control is down to you. And I know you’re gonna be brilliant._

_‘Okay, I think that’s it now,’_ the Doctor sighs. _‘You’ll make it fun! You’ll get to see your family! Say hi to the Khans for me, will you? And._’ She pauses. ‘_I really need you to trust me on this. It’s gonna be weird, I know, seeing my face when it’s me but not me, but I am counting on you for this. I trust you three. And I’m so looking forward to seeing you again so we can all have a great catch-up! But that’ll have to be in the future. For now, just keep an eye on Jane. She’ll be more grateful than she realises. _

_‘And thank you. Really. You three are amazing. It’s a privilege to travel with you, fam.’_

A hand snakes up to a button, and with a last, grim, smile – the video ends.

* * *

The silence that hushes this house full of life is the quiet sigh, maybe, of resignation. Deep knowing to their bones, their abandonment signed and sealed by the quiet of the video.

They really are on their own now. Alone with their thoughts, against the Limina. That’s all they have.

When the Doctor fades away, it’s only Yaz’s mind that projects her image, black canvas as good as white to paint the picture of unreality. Part of her wrestles with the wish to take over Ryan’s laptop and press ‘play’ again, to repeat the words until they make more sense of this entire situation. But that’s the nature of it: ignorance is not practical in all moments except this (at least, Yaz thinks, that’s what the Doctor believes) and by keeping themselves – and herself – in the dark, they stay alive for a little while longer. More connections mean more risks.

But she’s already connected to her, and she can’t change that.

‘How do we even start?’ Ryan asks. He lures the mouse to the top right corner of the black screen, and the video closes. White screen pours out light and makes them squint.

Graham huffs. ‘Anyone got a plan?’

Yaz is so busy reaching out to the Doctor’s image in her head, the thought of them together in the ship, reaching out to the stars, that she doesn’t notice the boys turn to her.

When she does register them, it’s because their eyes are wide.

She steels her shoulders, and the honour falls to her lay down the barricades.

‘We find the TARDIS,’ she decides.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> on a side note i really love how jodie has kept the doctor's physicality and made it her own, i just love her energy, i love her your honour


	3. three: doc_vlog_1.mp4

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _the dawns are speeding up_
> 
> _you know it'll hurt you_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> TWITTER USER BBC DOCTOR WHO MA'AM WHEN WILL YOU RELEASE US FROM THIS TORMENT
> 
> for this chapter i'd recommend listening to ['petals' by bibio](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jGbNrBpxTz0%22) it's good i promise
> 
> once more, thank you [ koraliss](https://archiveofourown.org/users/lieutenantsaavik) for being an absolutely stellar beta!

‘Here we go,’ Ryan says. He coughs.

‘I’m tryna do something a bit more natural to me... ’cause the three of us are feeling a little lost right now. Dunno what to do with ourselves.’ He pauses, frowning down at the floor.

‘I was about to do a gaming vlog ’cause I thought I hadn’t done one in a while.’ Pause. He looks up at the camera. ‘Actually I’d done it two weeks ago – two weeks ago for the rest of the world but not us. Feels like it were three months ago. And I – I wanted to tell you.’ He frowns. ‘I can’t always text Yaz ’cause she’s on duty and she wouldn’t see it and Graham’s out and he don’t get vlogging anyway. And I wanted to tell you and I can’t now, ’cause–I can’t ’cause you’re gone.

‘I know you’re coming back, though, so I might as well talk to you anyway. Not – not mad like. I’m not talking to myself. But in a vlog.’ He points up to the camera lens. ‘I mean I got the camera out and everything, might as well use it, yeah?

‘Okay. So. Uh.’ He scratches his head. And then sighs.

‘Mate, I didn’t even do this for Nan. I’m only doing this ’cause I know you’re coming back.

‘Anyway.

‘We watched your video, a week... eight days ago. We haven’t found Jane yet. We’re keepin’ a lookout ’cause you told us to but we ain’t found her yet. It’s like you’re—she’s a drop in the ocean. Just gone. We’ve looked ’round all the popular places but I don’t think Jane gets out much ’cause you’ve not done much shopping for someone who just moved here.

‘I, uh... I still can’t separate you and Jane in my head... it’s like – I know you’re in her head but she’s not you and that’s just weird, mate, it’s trippy. I actually don’t know what I’m gonna say to Jane when we eventually find her... ’cause I’m gonna be thinking is that it’s you, and I’m gonna expect you to grin at us... and put your arms around us and – wonder whether we can go round to Yaz’s for tea.’ The thought makes him smile. ‘Like you always do. You always wanna go ’round to Yaz’s.’

The smile drops. ‘We had to tell the Khans that you got a brain injury… amnesia that completely rewrote your brain or something. Took a whole night of planning, that did, wondering what the hell to say to people who don’t understand you. They took it alright but they were a bit confused.’ A pause. ‘And I don’t blame ’em. That was a whole new level of lyin’, even to Najia, and I don’t think Yaz liked that.

‘I get it. Lying to family…’ He shakes his head.

‘We’ve not seen her too much, actually… Yaz, I mean. Work gets in the way, you know? I got my warehouse shifts and then I’m doing my NVQ too... the garage, remember? On the first day I had to figure out which day it was and what I was s’posed to be doing. Think Yaz had to do that as well...just hope she had a bit more tact than me.’

A few seconds pass as Ryan struggles on what to say.

‘I’m s’posed to be telling you everything but I dunno what to say. Nothing’s happened much, and to be fair that’s the problem. I just went to work, saw my friends, went to the garage, did a test for my NVQ. And then I just… go home. Granddad makes dinner and then we sit and watch telly and then sleep. And all over again.’

Ryan looks directly at the camera now, resolute. ‘If Graham offers to cook for ya, then decline. Trust me, Doctor, don’t punish yourself.

‘It’s proper boring though. The only day I enjoyed was when we went to Meadowhall, looking for you. ’Cause it was the three of us! And we could talk about something other than what we had for tea! 

‘And that’s the worst thing, I think, Doctor. You showed us all these things and then you just dropped us off and we have to be okay with it. Like… we just have to get on with our lives and be proper normal. And I  _ know  _ you didn’t have a choice, I know it. We want you to be safe but, mate, how can we be normal now? We’ve travelled with you, we’ve seen things no one else will. We got our lives back home but that transition ain’t easy.’

He chuckles. ‘Like. Granddad’s started going on long walks… Graham, goin’ on walks. World’s gone upside down, mate. Upside down.

‘I dunno if it’s making him feel better or worse, to be honest. He comes home, makes dinner, watches footie and then goes to bed. Told me he’s finding it hard, having to adjust. ’Cause his mates think we’re still grieving over Nan and yeah, we are, but it’s easier now. ’Course, we can’t say that, can we, when the only reason we’ve had time to process is ’cause we’ve been all over space and time. Easier to grieve if you’ve got all the time in the universe. I guess.’ 

Ryan shrugs. ‘Maybe he’s just walking to keep up appearances. I dunno, to be honest. Thought he’d be bored of it by now.

‘Though I might join him. Could ask Yaz, too, if she’s free.

‘It’s like there’s a cloud over her now, Doctor. She’s not taken it well. Don’t think she thought you’d be gone just like that, and you’re special to her, proper special. She’s been looking out for the TARDIS while patrolling, she says, and looking out for Jane too. She hasn’t found them yet and I don’t think she’s gonna soon. God knows where you put that TARDIS.’ He adds, ‘And Jane stumbled out of it too? To her new home? Madness.

‘Yaz’s convinced that finding the TARDIS is the key to all this. Honestly... I’m not about it. ’Cause what can we do right now? We don’t know where it is or how to start lookin’ for it. We don’t know how long it’s gonna be around and what we can do with it. She wants to look at the library to see if you’ve got anything on the Limina but...I don’t know, Doc. I don’t know. ’Cause what about Jane? She’s out there somewhere, and she’s in danger and that’s what’s important… even though she don’t know us ’cause she’s a total stranger and we’re strangers to her.

‘I know that finding Jane will actually work. We make sure she’s safe that way. That the Limina ain’t gonna get her. What use is a bit of info about the monsters if they already get to her?

‘It’s all madness, Doctor. We dunno what to do. We dunno how to defend ourselves. And to be honest, I don’t think that’s even our main priority right now. I think we’re just... tryna be okay.’

He becomes shyer now, aware of the end of his thoughts. He rubs at the back of his neck.

‘I uh – I hope I don’t end up making too many of these for you. Don't wanna bore ya.’ A final pause. ‘See you, Doctor.’

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> give ryan hugs always


	4. four: feeble offerings

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _i've taken the puzzle in me_
> 
> _and left it scrambled for all to see_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> anyone else watch bbc children in need last night? such a wonderful/tear-jerking programme. jodie, mandip and tosin coming out to surprise that little girl was the absolute CUTEST i _wept_
> 
> for this chapter, i'd recommend listening to ['unworthy'](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ls8-NwffvgE) by what is clearly one of my new favourite artists, vancouver sleep clinic.
> 
> thank you once more to [ koraliss](https://archiveofourown.org/users/lieutenantsaavik) for betaing and crying over ryan with me !

_ Yazzy (15:04): Can I be honest and emotional with you? _

_ Ryan (15:05): yh ofc what do u wanna say _

_ Yazzy (15:05): I really miss the Doctor _

_ Yazzy (15:05): I could escape my family with her _

_ Yazzy (15:06): I could see some amazing things _

_ Yazzy (15:06): I could prove myself over and over again _

_ Yazzy (15:06): I could actually have those chances _

_ Yazzy (15:07): Now I’m back I don’t do anything and I get Sonya laughing to her friends about how I have this ‘weird crush’ on the Doctor _

_ Yazzy (15:07): It’s annoying _

_ Yazzy (15:08): And wrong _

_ Yazzy (15:09): I don’t have a crush. _

_ Ryan (15:10): ok _

_ Ryan (15:10): i would call so u can rant but i can’t _

_ Ryan (15:12): at the garage _

_ Yazzy (15:12): Your placement right? _

_ Ryan (15:13): yh _

_ Ryan (15:13): not sposed to b on my phone _

_ Yazzy (15:13): Then get back to work! _

_ Ryan (15:14): u said u needed to b honest + emotional _

_ Ryan (15:14): trust me it’s better to say it all _

_ Ryan (15:15): graham’s drilled it into me _

_ Ryan (15:16): cas is covering for me anyway while the boss is out _

_ Ryan (15:16): my feet hurt _

_ Yazzy (15:18): Cas? Is that the guy who gave himself a Roman nickname? Cassius? _

_ Ryan (15:21): yh _

_ Ryan (15:21): eman _

_ Ryan (15:21): listen it’s a bit weird but he was like 14 ok _

_ Ryan (15:21): it just stuck _

_ Ryan (15:22): he’s a cool guy anyway _

_ Ryan (15:22): proper good mechanic actually _

_ Ryan (15:22): AND a man u fan _

_ Ryan (15:24): honestly it’s not a bad nickname _

_ Ryan (15:25): would u give urself a historical nickname _

_ Yazzy (15:26): Yaz is just fine for me _

_ Yazzy (15:26): Don’t think I didn’t see you save me in your phone as Yazzy _

_ Ryan (15:27): lmao _

_ Ryan (15:27): gotta go _

_ Ryan (15:27): also _

_ Ryan (15:27): i miss the doctor too _

_ Ryan (15:27): she’s gonna come back soon ok _

_ Yazzy (15:28): Okay _

_ Yazzy (15:28): Thanks, Ryan _

_ Ryan (17:03): np np _

* * *

As officers are often put on patrol together, during their training programme a probationary police officer is required to be regularly accompanied by a superior officer to supervise, advise, and intervene on behalf of the trainee. This is the supervisor’s responsibility to organise, with the express agreement of whichever officer is also on shift.

Not permanently, but regularly. Training is important, but stretched resources hit hard. Being ‘accompanied,’ in more professional terms, happens once in a blue moon, when one of her colleagues can no longer stomach the prospect of facing their ever-mounting tasks and, in a moment of retrospective self-injury, agrees to procrastinate these tasks even more. It’s never one of her more qualified superiors, who are greyed by a triple threat: they must ask more of their employees, are asked more of by their superiors, and must dedicate even more of their time to tasks and to management than they realistically possess. Thus the wheel spins, and the pointer’s answer will land on whichever poor, unfortunate soul has enough time on their hands to ignore their other responsibilities.

The police officers here, like in any station, are a bag of different personalities, whom Yaz relates to like Marmite.

When she patrols with PC Tali, they spend the entire night in silence except for their mandatory work discussions. PC Halliday continues his ‘class clown’ persona even on the streets, exhausting and delighting in equal measure. She has patrolled numerous times with her supervisor, in previous tests for her training, and Sunder’s barely-suppressed exasperation has never wavered, never ebbed or flowed. She has also patrolled multiple times with PC Lucas, a man of considerable size and little care for negativity despite the nature of his role. Of all her experiences, Mikey Lucas is perhaps the best patrol companion. Without fail, she will cross her fingers under the table and hope it is him today, please, God, let it be someone interesting.

Partly because of these encounters, and partly because of her own personality, the times when her patrol is interrupted by another being can be privately unwelcome. The arrival of a job on a patrol is a whole other kettle of fish – doing something, _ anything _, is received gratefully in the most tedious moments. But the arrival of someone else’s thoughts, someone who she might not mesh well with despite her best intentions, interrupts what could otherwise be a straightforward shift. And Yaz can usually manage that. It’s part of the job, after all.

Just not tonight.

The stars are out tonight.

Winter is cruel. Winter is cruel to the people down below. The elderly shivering under a blanket. The frozen tips of young fingers too stubborn to wear the gloves parents insists they put on. The barbecues of summer and the smiles on people’s faces faded away after the passing of Bonfire Night; Christmas revives them with the promise of seasonal joy, but that, too, only lasts so long. February abandons the pretences of January’s short-lived optimism and appeals to human’s temptation by distraction: red hearts and chocolates make up for long nights and bitter northern winds. But it’s one step closer to spring.

For all the warmth that arrives in spring, and the hazy, gorgeous days of summer, the sunny seasons fall short in their lens of the sky. Clear, cold nights are best for stargazing, the clouds skulking away to return when morning first makes it call. In darkness, in real darkness, the heavens shine through.

She reflects, nowadays, on all her childhood years of gazing up at them, having no idea about what was to unfold. The stars and their fires, and the long mystery of their burning. She’d know some of their names, make out constellations when she could – Orion and his belt, the Plough, Pegasus – but their distance seemed complete. They were unavailable, reminders of humility from which humanity comes. At the end of everything, the stars are always persevering. Strength sewn into the very seams of space itself.

Seeing them up close brings a new sense of gratitude Yaz can’t imagine very many people on Earth currently have. The astronauts, certainly; maybe pilots too. Everyone who has flown on a plane, dangled from a height, glimpses it in smaller doses. That intimate knowledge of physics, feeling made physical, theories and equations demonstrated by the sight of miniscule trees and a million, billion lives playing out below.

It feels like she’s becoming part of that distance too. Never a God, but definitely not unenlightened. There’s nothing like feeling space wind raise the hairs on the back of their necks and they know it, the three of them; they know the feeling of it has changed them. Sometimes the memory will become alive in her imagination, and she pictures the hairs standing up on edge all over her arms, the shake of adrenaline. She’ll remember the howls of light whipping out from supernovae and dwarf stars, iridescent spectrums and that scary, incomprehensible froth of energy. In the lightest moments, the light from the memories humbles her. In the heaviest, the thought of it works like an engine.

In all of them, she feels a part of it. She feels that unearthly distance. And shivers run down her spine.

The intermittent beeps from the patrol car radio get lost to background noise; she’s used to the background conversation the TARDIS has with them anyway, with its little sounds and bleeps, something far more than human and a whole lot more wonderful for it. If she closes her eyes, she can conjure the landing sounds almost as loud as real life. That groaning, that wheezing, all the possibility that bursts from its wooden blue doors. The thrum of spaceship becomes a hum in her head, a comforting gesture when her thoughts veer into pits of helplessness, and she’ll feel that distance – that connection to something unlimited.

Under starlight, she closes her eyes.

Her decision to find the TARDIS gets clearer and clearer in her head by the hour. She knows the risks, obviously, but their position is so disadvantageous currently that any information is better than nothing at all. Even Yaz, the only one of the three humans who ventured out of the TARDIS on that fateful expedition, cannot remember much about the aliens which have petrified the Doctor this much. Just the outline, the hooded sceptre freezing the victim into place. The terrible deflating of their skull.

The Doctor’s voice dropping an octave, defined by its certainty as much as the deep shake that threatened all emotion.

We have to go. _ Now _, she announced – meaning, go immediately, go yesterday, we should never have been here in the first place.

And it’s one thing for the Doctor to say it. It’s something else entirely for the Doctor to whole-heartedly mean it.

Yaz’s eyes snap open. The recollection isn’t necessary. She thinks of the TARDIS hum again, dreaming pasts with eyes wide open. Her heartbeat de-escalates.

Faced with such a deep, dark unknown – doesn’t it make sense for her to look for information? Any necessities they can get their hands on, to defend themselves with. The Limina may have power untested here but they have brains, brains undeflated, and they can use them.

She’s tried the web, anyway. The three of them have, did that night. Knowing themselves to be condemned, they drew attention to themselves, Googling ‘UFO Sheffield’ and God knows how many other related searches. Delving into sites full of denialists, theories they never want to see again, all for a glimpse of the foe they are setting themselves against. No trace, though, of the Limina. For a species so devastating, she remembers thinking, they do well to stay out of the spotlight. Surely, something would have trickled down to the Earth through the lightwaves, through the power of collective thought?

The notion struck her then, sinking down into Graham’s sofa, that maybe the Limina were never meant to reach Earth at all; that they, in their desperation – in their stupidity – had lured the monsters to an even bigger prize. Yaz was not at all been reticent to point the finger at the Doctor in that moment.

‘But what choice did she have, Yaz?’ Graham reasoned. ‘Imagine if she’d dropped us off on a strange planet for a year.’ A _ year _. That consuming ocean called time. ‘We woulda drawn attention to ourselves even more, wouldn’t we? Strange species on a strange planet with a strange blue box.’

‘And a strange human who don’t remember anything,’ Ryan added, to receive a deep nod from his grandfather.

‘We’d land Saturday night and be cooked for Sunday dinner.’

She knew – knows – that Graham had a point. It became part of her own argument. Familiarity breeds creativity; landing them on their own planet gives them the space to think as well as hide. Fitting in is made easier, but so too is defence; and their desperation to defend their home is satisfied.

The image of her family, her friends, the places she’s been and the homes she’s lived in, all outweigh the knowledge that interacting with the TARDIS makes their possibility energy more potent. But knowing the Doctor is safe comes first. Like they said, they are already condemned. If the Limina get them, at least Earth won’t be defenceless.

So. The TARDIS.

Keeping a lookout, day and night, requires an extra vigilance that is exhausting as it is consuming. Looking for something invisible feels as impossible as it sounds; everything and nothing becomes it. Blue street corners by dinky cafes, Porta-Loos used by builders and roadworkers. The reflection of an architectural feature caught in the window of a bus. The TARDIS is everything she wants and nothing she can find. She adores it and despairs of it in equal measure.

The hunt does not pause for work, and Yaz knew this as soon as she decided. The patrol car, at least, makes exploration of Sheffield significantly easier. Sharpening her observance, the crowded streets a new puzzle book. Any one of these ordinary people could be hiding the world’s greatest advantage – and isn’t it always like that?

* * *

Yaz finally becomes aware that Sunman has stopped talking. She drags her head away from the sight of the stars outside her window to be pinned, instead, by big, beady eyes set into an asymmetrical face being trained on her. His mouth quivers with the tail-end of his question. She doesn’t know how long she’s kept him waiting. She knows he doesn’t particularly care.

Though it’s hard for her to stop caring. He's tedious, but he's a friendly face in the mire of the night. Not to mention he is her superior. Immediately, she stiffens her spine and drops the elbow resting on the window interior. 

‘Sorry?’ she asks, hoping it doesn’t deepen her transgression any further.

‘Stevens,’ he says, ‘intervening in my case?’ The incriminating silence that follows would be enough to deter anyone but him. Safe in the knowledge that Yaz has not paid attention to his previous monologue, he decides to persevere with it. ‘I bet he’s discussed it with one of his colleagues. Has he mentioned it to you?’

Yaz wonders what on Earth he would even say. Then again, she thinks, he did complain about a coffee machine. To Sunder, of all people.

She makes a face, pulls the corners of her mouth right down. ‘Never really talked to him,’ she replies. ‘He wouldn’t bother himself with talking to us trainees, would he?’ Everybody knows that, surely?

He acquiesces. ‘Yeah. Good point, nice one.’ The lack of contact deflates him a little. Yaz hopes that’s the end of the conversation, but – ‘I don’t understand why he has to nitpick through my notes. Everyone here can make decent notes, right? Otherwise they wouldn’t be hired! So why me?’

Yaz has seen the state of his paperwork and the alarming amount of missing sheets, simply by passing by his desk. She debates whether to stay silent or to invoke some sense of solidarity. Common adversaries, and all that. Not that Yaz finds DSI Stevens particularly adversarial – just his reputation.

‘I just find it weird that he’s in my business.’

‘Isn’t that his job?’ she frowns.

A pause. ‘Yeah, sure.’ Sunman squirms in his seat. ‘But. Mainly they don’t. Too busy themselves, aren’t they?’

They ruminate on the state of police funding in silence.

‘Maybe he’s been told to step up,’ Yaz eventually says, and they let the quiet continue.

They’ve parked on the drive of a small phone repair shop, the third of five shops pushed together to greet this busy road. Yaz can imagine the neon lights and the flashing signs stuck to the shops’ front windows, promising deals and discounts, though in reality there are no signs of life or light coming from behind them. The insides of the repair shop are populated only by video games, the new releases of at least two years ago. Next to them, a car languishes, the property of a nearby resident on the opposite side of the street. With a few trees lined down the pavement, the cars can make themselves inconspicuous here.

And it’s a good thing, too, because they need their eyes on the road now. To their left, they can see a convertible coming up the road, too far over the speed limit to pay homage to the laws of convention and common sense, and as soon as it gets close enough the ANPR immediately clocks it. Stolen. Grounds for arrest. 

Though this is primarily the job of the qualified traffic cops, as the first witnesses they’re obligated to follow. Yaz jumps on the accelerator pedal instinctively, the police car swinging to right itself on the road and pursue the lawbreaker. Sunman has snatched the radio up to report the transgression. He keeps it close, breathing into the switched-off mouthpiece. There’s no knowing how this may go.

Adrenaline is burning up her blood. Yaz has never had an incident like this before. She’ll be relieved when her qualified colleagues take over but, for now, she’s the one on whom all this depends. Her arms are rigid on the steering wheel, but her navigation the nighttime traffic is as smooth as always. She keeps her eye on him.

‘He’s definitely going at least eighty,’ Sunman gapes at the machine propped up on the dashboard. ‘The idiot.’

Although their driving is inconsiderate, Yaz doesn’t find it too difficult to keep them in view. To both cars’ advantage, most of the night time roads feature only immobile cars, enough of a danger if you’re out of control but not enough to cancel out the progress made by the empty stretches of road. Plenty of space to slam down the accelerator if you’re inclined that way.

A natural bend in the road, an earthly incline, forces the driver to slow down a little. Yaz reaches the suspect’s side, close enough to start guiding the car into pulling over – but then as soon as the car is in gear, it hurtles away like the fear of God itself is spinning its wheels. Yaz swears under her breath. She should’ve been faster. Matching the speed of her charge, she switches the lights and siren on.

Houses flying by the windows. This is a pursuit now, her pulse pursuing faster speeds, higher, throbbing. The tyres screech around a corner; she feels alive; feels the sound slam against the walls of future memory. Sunman updates HQ on the developing situation; requests more cars from Dispatch.

The Doctor’s voice echoes in her head, and in the reflection of the windows, the image of her burns in Yaz’s periphery. Sunman’s serious profile melts into the Doctor’s disappointed pout. Not knowing herself, not knowing the tragedy about to befall them. It picks at her heart, the way a diner picks at cooked flesh between bones.

She grits her teeth. She has her priority. Blood pumping through her veins at double speed: she swears it’s because of the task at hand.

(If she repeats it enough in her head, it’s true.)

The Doctor and her adventures. Isn’t this adventure enough? The thought is half-hearted in its creation and dies a quiet death.

The car darts onto a pedestrian street and Yaz follows. It’s narrower than the previous roads, vehicles asleep with only two wheels parked on the kerb, so Yaz has to weave and bob the police car through the maze.

At her side, Sunman keeps the radio on, regularly reporting their whereabouts, predicting the suspect’s journey before the car proves him right. It helps Yaz relax a little, at least in theory; guiding the police car to where they need to go, attempting to cut off the suspect from any roads that would lead them away from where the force’s traffic cops are being deployed.

‘Did you catch sight of the driver?’ Sunman asks. A crackle of life from the radio; the report has been received.

‘No,’ Yaz replies. She was too busy trying to predict how the driver would move. It’s a weird road, she justifies, burdened by an incline, and the reg plate wasn’t one she recognised.

‘It’s that bloody Jamie Boyle again,’ her partner enlightens her, and he scoffs. ‘I’ve pulled him over a lot. How he’s still on the streets, I’ve no idea, what with all the times I’ve arrested him. I guess everyone has though.’

And now she recognises the name. Even Yaz has had to deal with Jamie, though usually he simply throws abuse at her from a safe distance. Even the worst of them can be chickens.

She can see him clear as day in her head: curly cropped hair, suspicious eyes, and a face pasty and pockmarked with past spots and future troubles. He grins a lot, an infuriating grin halfway between a simper and a smirk, as if in on a joke the rest of them can’t decipher. Maybe he believes it, Yaz doesn’t know. But she’s met far more people like that than he – or anyone – will ever realise, so it’s a tired act she has no patience for tonight.

‘Okay,’ she says, because the camaraderie of the conversation got lost in Sunman’s humble-brag, and her mind is on more pressing things. Jamie seems to be taking them on a tour of the town, weaving in and out of main roads and darting back into streets he’s familiar with. With a shock, Yaz realises she remembers them too. These are streets other cops have talked about, places where they arrested or pulled Jamie over before. She can see – no, _ feel _– the smile on his face as he drives, no doubt revelling in the fact that it’s PC Khan pursuing; the probationary officer, the ‘prim little PC Paki,’ as his favourite saying for her goes.

The radio brings confirmation of two – two! – cars deployed from Dispatch, prepared to ensnare their favourite traffic nuisance, and through the radio they and Sunman hatch a plan on where to apprehend Jamie, and how. As the conversation trickles into her ears, the muscles in her arms start to relax. She can do this. She’s got this.

The lights of the police car make everything flicker, washing everything in a glaring blue, instead of being obscured by dark or in orange streetlight. It makes everything look familiar and alien simultaneously. Nothing can hide under these lights. Everything exposed, everything accommodated for. Cold and effective.

Back onto a wider street, the dangers now are moving cars. Jamie could collide with any of these – though so far he’s been frustratingly nimble during high-speed pursuits – and so could she.

She and Sunman, surprisingly, are on the same wavelength. He keeps telling her to be careful, to watch out for that car, for that Prius – ‘They’ll be panicking,’ as if she hasn’t already thought that – and she sets her jaw. He’s necessary, but that isn't. She stops herself from snapping at him just in time.

Jamie makes a last-second turn onto another residential street; Yaz rushes past on the main street and has to take a parallel route to intercept him further down. Sunman sighs and Yaz’s jaw starts to ache. Maybe if he stopped bloody patronising her.

They both hear from the radio a jolt of information: the other police cars have arrived, and together the three of them will be able to stop him. It’ll be the job of the first back-up police car to take the place of Yaz and Sunman, they know; her partner informs their colleagues of the change of plan and Yaz goads the car to speed up. She’s pushing seventy, on a main street. 

Protected by the buffer of the wide roads between them, the houses either side of them peer on. Normal, placid lives are being illuminated for a second by the cold blue, and its promise of the dangerous, the exciting, the ridiculous. To think, they would not glimpse a high-speed chase outside their front doors if Jame were not being his usual stupid self.

To think, Yaz would still be gazing up at the stars and tuning out Sunman, if Jamie were not being his usual stupid self.

It’s only the missed corner that goes wrong. Sunman and Yaz turn onto the adjacent street and immediately spot their colleague up ahead. A few seconds behind, Yaz turns the car onto the final street and the trap falls into place. Boxed in by police cars across the road, the two-way system made redundant by parked cars. He can’t go forward, can’t go back, and can’t escape through the street Yaz and Sunman’s car have come from. Game over.

Yaz exhales. They've done it.

He doesn’t even try to run. Lit up by the streetlights, by the police, everyone gathering in the street can see him rise out of his seat and slam the door shut. His face painted by the condemnation of the cold. His very own mask hiding darker things, perhaps. Before Yaz’s colleagues reach him to lock handcuffs around his wrists, he turns to where she is parked and takes an exaggerated bow.

‘Twat,’ Sunman growls. He looks over to Yaz and gives her a nod and a thumbs-up. Yaz smiles quickly, but they waste no time, unbuckling seatbelts and opening the doors to be welcomed by the sirens of a successful police chase.

* * *

Yaz doesn’t arrest Jamie herself. PCs Tali, Lee and Attoah have already risen to the job of detaining him, having a near-friendly chat in the process. Sunman handles overview communications with HQ, while Yaz joins PC Tang in dealing with the public. Curious onlookers, a police scene nightmare.

Crowds have amassed like a swarm, the buzz a heady cacophony of curiosity and disdain for the criminal. Jamie is a local; at once a hero and a pariah. They know he plays into it well, puts on a show. It’s more of a pantomime than a Shakespearean tragedy: a back and forth exchange between actors and audience, the police an easy target at which rebukes are thrown or parried.

Though that’s just a few of them. Most onlookers are merely nosy. Shivering in their slippers, tartan pyjamas hidden underneath coats and crossed arms. Braving the bracing cold to glimpse the spectacle, just to point at the articles on their phones tomorrow and say, I was there when that lad got arrested. These are my five seconds of fame, by proxy. Better than nothing, for a lot of them.

They stay calm for these people, the audience who aren’t there for trouble. They throw firm, disappointed looks at the resident who thinks it fun to yell, ‘Pigs!’ every half-minute, but shielded at the back of the crowd, they can’t do much about what he’s saying – and neither can he. Everyone’s braver when they don’t have to face the consequences.

Yaz’s mind flashes to the Doctor, helplessness hitting her like a wave.

She and Tang do their best to dissuade the crowd from staying, citing an impediment to private police business. Some take heed, and retreat gratefully towards indoor heating and cups of tea; others shrug the consideration off, moving away to return a minute later, phone out and Snapchat open. Others only move when she and Tang lightly tap them on the shoulder, unable to do anything more. An audience like this is a wild thing, the calmer having disappeared to leave the volatile more exposed, and best tamed gingerly lest it bite your fingers off. It’s dependent on the night: on the cops and the criminals; but in places stricken by struggles and bare bank accounts, the tension can roll through them like wind. 

Yaz is explaining the benefits of minding your own business when a flicker of blue alights on a cuboid structure, locked away behind wooden gates. Placed cosily in between two houses, the wooden cage protects the street from the near-limitless power of the electricity coursing inside the generator. So is it the generator? Surely she’d have clocked it immediately. There can't be much space there, she knows, but she can't shake the idea out of her head. What if…? She shakes her head to herself. She's on police duty. She can't. She's talking to someone anyway.

But it pulls at her, the possibility, the notion of unknowing too much to bear. She keeps looking back.

Every glance convinces her.

‘Ah, well, fuck you too, then,’ the woman spits, and shuffles off.

‘Sorry, excuse me,’ is Yaz’s distracted response, somewhere between thought and sound. She's not even looking at her.

Hours of justification and apprehension are swirling inside her. She can’t think about much else. She catches sight of Tang thanking one man in the crowd for helping to move everyone along, and sees her moment.

It’s a heaving mass, this group, but now that Jamie’s in the car, they’re in no immediate danger. Not for the moment, anyway. She starts to move away.

PC Tang sees her walking. Not as preoccupied as she thought. ‘Yasmin?’ he asks. ‘What are you doing?’

‘Hang on a sec,’ she shouts back, a hand up, as if this is satisfactory. But what on Earth would she say?

Her legs are delighting in being used after so long sitting down, so much so they are almost vocal about it. Through the mist of her own breath, she vaguely glimpses Jamie in the window. They’ll be going immediately; then the crowd dispersing will start in earnest, and Sunman will replace Tang in their crowd control. She has to be quick, then, has to conform to her police duties before she gets questioned anymore. God knows she’s going to get questioned anyway. She tries the cage, but it refuses to open. A relief to everyone else, the high voltage out of reach, but it’s not a reassurance right now. If she’s caught fiddling with a lock – and with no TARDIS to prove any sort of innocence…

It doesn’t bear thinking about. Her pulse is pounding in her ears, ears red with cold air and embarrassment. That keen sense of wrongdoing is almost a familiar companion by now, well-acquainted with the accompanying certainty of righteousness.

Dammit, Doctor. Why couldn’t you help us?

She already looks like a loony, but she’s committed to this. A breath out. Her flashlight still in the car, she digs out her phone from her trouser pocket and taps on the torch light. She holds onto a wooden slab and peers through, the torchlight illuminating the insides. Boxy structures come alive under inspection.

But it’s nothing. Just generators, one planted behind another. Their quiet whirring is barely audible above the clamour outside of their world. Then the blue lights tear through her confusion. The front generator had tricked her. Now she can see it: not quite TARDIS blue, but close enough for the desperate to be deceived.

Her hope collapses.

* * *

Ryan asks at least three times to use the police car before he gets the message that, no, Yaz absolutely cannot borrow police property again. Especially not for a near-pointless search like this, for an alien ship like this, something that should not even be known to reside on this planet. 

He’s not without persistence, though, and to his credit Yaz almost changes her mind.

Almost.

She is off shift, having slept but not felt any better for it. But she’s glad to be out of the police car. The incident this morning has not done much for her confidence.

She knows her own worth, knows her ability, so even having to be in that position, having to brush off Tang and Sunman’s questions, is infuriating. She’s an adult. She knows the rules and the procedures; she could recite them in her sleep. She even has, once. She’d not wander off unless she thought it paramount, more of a danger to the public than a genuine criminal.

She’s spent most of her time off puzzling at her own determination. Blue light – she was so sure. Tricks of the eye can’t be faked, she knows, unless you’re desperate.

And she needs the TARDIS more than anything.

Almost anything, and the thought, a quick correction, is dogged with a freezing panic. She needs the Doctor to come back.

The chances, though, of a TARDIS appearing just after an arrest are small. The coincidence of it appearing as Yaz arrived is too good to be true. It’s not impossible; Yaz has never thought the TARDIS to be limited by anything. But it’s not likely.

And with relatively little time having passed since they last saw her? No.

The problem with this predicament, she counters, is the TARDIS’ magnetism. If the Doctor has hidden the TARDIS away because of the Limina, then Yaz’s plan will attract the Limina to the ship. This they’ve already debated. And on the off-chance it happens – that near-impossibility, the rarity of circumstance that becomes circumstantial around the Doctor – then all those people were in danger. She doesn’t even know if the Limina are here yet, but she can’t risk them being so close to such a big group of people like that – innocent people who didn’t ask for this.

That's what she signed up for, when she joined the police. Even from aliens – _ especially _ from aliens. Especially from the Limina.

Especially with what they did to—

‘To what?’ Ryan asks. The car radio intrudes on the unspoken with a boisterous traffic update. He reaches over to yank the volume down. 

Yaz says nothing. A quick ejection of air escapes her nose. How strange it is to keep things quiet from Ryan. She’s started handling the memories like duck eggs; her touch light, her palms cupped. Too rough a doing over rips apart the gentle membrane, cracks it all; soils the sacred. These are memories she wants to cradle.

But it makes no sense to keep it from the boys. Someone else might run roughshod over that last night together, but not them. Not here, not now, not ever.

It’s an old coping mechanism, formed from a need to fortify her heart. At least she’s self-aware enough to recognise that.

But they miss the Doctor too.

‘We saw someone die,’ Yaz says, and the words linger, with nowhere else to go. ‘Killed by the Limina.’ They've taken a turn onto a road with a park, faced immediately by a row of houses. Trees dominate the pavements either side of them, enormous, hulking figures stripped bare of their life during winter. But she can feel it, she can see it. Life so undeniable it is bursting through the tarmac. Life and all of its power.

The deflating keeps playing on repeat in her head.

‘I'm sorry,’ Ryan murmurs. ‘Didn't know.’

Yaz has to stomp on the brake as a resident’s car pulls out from the kerb, without indicators or consideration for anyone else. From its placement in the back of the car, Ryan’s gym bag veers into the back of his passenger seat. ‘Not your fault,’ she says. The car drives off. She starts the car back up again. ‘We didn't tell you.’

A beat passes. They watch as the car passes by a woman in a white coat. ‘We thought you just saw them,’ Ryan says. ‘Like, they spotted you, you two went, “Oh, damn,” and got scarce.’

It makes Yaz laugh, despite herself, despite the conversation. ‘Kind of, actually.’ They start moving again, the mechanisms of the car a second nature. It seems all Yaz does is drive, lately. ‘The Doctor reckoned they knew she was there even without seeing us, so we came back to the TARDIS.’

‘That was all it took? Didn't even have to see her?’

‘No. Apparently they don’t work like that.’

The traffic report comes up again; Ryan lunges over for a second time and shuts it up. He looks a little put out when Yaz leans over afterwards to turn the radio off entirely.

‘Will they have to see us?’ He already knows the answer.

‘No.’

‘So we're doomed whatever we do,’ he repeats to himself. 

‘Yeah.’

Accompanied by the grumble of the engine, Ryan curses softly.

* * *

They’ve given up on searching this part of Sheffield. Crawling along in the car at such a slow pace reminds Yaz of her shifts, and each empty street compounds Ryan’s belief that Yaz’s plan won't work. Not that he rubs it in.

Instead, they talk about music. They switch the radio back on to sing along to it. They point out different places of interest, recount primary school memories. Ryan divulges that Graham is considering getting a dog: they spend half an hour trying to think of the most ill-suited dog for the man, knowing instinctively that he’d be a great owner regardless. Ryan starts to consider suggesting a Great Dane just to see the look on Graham’s face, and the thought causes Yaz to wipe tears of laughter from her eyes.

They avoid talking about the Doctor for as long as they can.

Circling the same streets, the same conversations, eventually saps at their energy. Ryan’s fifth conversation about working with Cassius, at the warehouse _ and _ the garage, peters out eventually. She’s delighted that Ryan has a friend in him – or, as Yaz knows him from primary school, Eman – but there’s only so much she can take before the elephant in the room starts playing with their tempers. Sleep-deprived as she is, the last thing she wants to do is snap at her best friend.

Especially when he’s excited to spend a few hours with Cassius at the gym tonight. She can’t do that to him.

‘Can I suggest somewhere?’ he asks. He can’t fully look at Yaz in the eye, she assumes from talking so much. ‘It's near Halifax. I'll give you directions.’

‘Of course,’ Yaz says, and despite herself, she smiles.

Winter’s chill gives the Peak District a new glow. Frost from icy nights persists at these heights, giving browned fern and stubborn grasses a constant gleam. The green that survives the cold, the mud, and the trampling is the bravest. The grasses rise even higher, against common sense, and it’s these that glimmer the brightest. As the two friends trek up to the summit, the car parked and locked down below, Yaz takes in their intransigence. Brown ferns crowd in on parts of the way, but walkers have stomped in hiking boots here for centuries, and in trainers, Yaz can manage.

At the top, they pull their coats further across their bodies and gaze at Sheffield down below. Blood orange light from an afternoon sun. Houses painted in sunset. Motorbikes whiz through streams of traffic, the hum of movement ever present; reminding the two of them that when they are done being one with the Earth, modernity will always be there to greet them.

Ryan blows on his hands. In between puffs, he notes, ‘I try to ride my bike up here.’ He continues walking forward and, for a millisecond, Yaz almost tells him to stop before he goes over the edge and plummets to the ground below. But he knows where he’s going.

There is a rocky ledge they can perch in, seemingly cut out from the hilltop to provide a different view for the weary traveller. The slate grey rocks are freezing as they sit, even with their coats providing a buffer, so the destination is at first uncomfortable.

‘I threw my bike from up there,’ Ryan remembers, and he motions to the summit behind them. ‘Got so annoyed with the bloody thing. Made Nan mad. Granddad was just tryna keep me calm’' He points slightly to his left, and further down into a small copse. ‘And I found Tim Shaw’s ship down there. Then I saw you for the first time in like—’

‘A decade,’ Yaz supplies.

‘Mate, don't say it like that,’ Ryan huffs. ‘We ain't old.’

Yaz laughs.

The day is bracing enough, but up here the wind whips their skin like knives. This wild, bitter thing; it keeps singing to them. Ryan has his hood up. Yaz has buried her face into the collar of her coat, letting the fur around the hood's edge provide some soft resistance. But her eyes are stinging.

‘Do you ever blame the Doctor?’ she asks. ‘For what happened to Grace, I mean.’

Grief’s pain must be grating here, she thinks, exposed as they are. There’s nothing but the wind howling their insecurities back at them. And down below, everyone is tiny, unreachable; getting on with their lives without any acknowledgement of the lonely ones watching from above. Up here and vulnerable.

‘In my worst moments, yeah,’ he eventually admits. His words are slow, deliberate. Each thought is a notion tread a thousand times, but still searching, still hurting. ‘But she didn’t tell Nan to climb it. That was Nan’s choice.’ He looks over at Yaz, and his gaze is so certain, so earnest, that she cannot help but return it. Her eyes sting more from it. ‘I wouldn't ever swap Nan’s life for this. But I’m glad this is what my life is, after she died. If I’d blamed the Doctor for something she didn’t do, I wouldn’t be able to enjoy any of the things we’ve done together, as a… a group.’ He frowns. ‘A team.’

‘A fam?’ Yaz suggests.

‘No! No,’ he insists, and they both chuckle.

It dies down. Ryan sighs, blows on his hands again. Afterwards: ‘Travelling with the Doctor let us deal with it on our own, without expectations. I’m realising that now, what with being home and all.’

Yaz has started shivering. ‘What do you mean?’

Ryan shrugs. But his thoughts are clear in his eyes. ‘We grieved however we wanted, Yaz. Didn’t have nobody asking us how we were, saying how nice the grave was, if they could help, making us go counselling. We made them decisions on our own, we did it with you guys. ’Cause of how she died – it wouldn't make sense to talk to anyone else. They wouldn't get it. But you two got it.’ He dips his head. ‘You understood.’

Truthfully, Yaz had needed Ryan and Graham in those moments; less so than the reverse, but still enough. For someone so fleeting in Yaz’s life, the weight of Grace’s significance had pressed down on her and the Doctor. Her help in defeating Tzim Sha; her love for her husband and her grandson. They owed her so much. Still, their grief was not about the two of them but about their friends, and helping them through it. Knowing the boys were okay wasn’t always achievable, but it was what they needed. They’d wanted to understand, to get them through it.

Mired in her own grief as she is, it is deeply relieving to know that she and the Doctor had helped.

His next breath is large, as if his statement requires it. ‘The Doctor can’t help how the Limina work. You know she wouldn’t let it be like this if she could change it.’ He scratches at his temple, and waits a beat. ‘Wish she could, though. This is a _ nightmare _.’

Yaz gives a half-smile. ‘You can say that again.’ They mull it over, the resignation.

The wind picks up before dying down a little, whispering through her bones. At the sight of Ryan’s resultant shiver, she wishes she had a flask of tea to share with him.

‘Dad’s messaged me again, asking to meet up.’ The expression on his face is thoughtful, though Yaz knows there are depths to his thoughts that her words alone cannot capture. Feelings are like that, sometimes, especially those you’ve never encountered before. Here is Ryan, her best friend: sometimes unfathomable.

‘You going to?’ she wonders. A particularly bad shiver animates her entire body.

‘Yeah,’ he answers, and he nods. Stops; nods again. ‘Told him I’ll see him once a month though. Maybe once a fortnight. He’s glad of that. Getting possessed by a Dalek don’t absolve _ everything _.’

Yaz hums in agreement.

‘And, like – I have to explain to Cas, to my mates, that we’re alright now. Sorta. ’Cause to them, i’'s a bit of flip; they’ve only known him as deadbeat. Suddenly he’s here and I’m alright with it. Sorta. And it don’t make sense to ’em.’ He scoffs. ‘Had to make up some story, said he nearly died or summat. Almost got run over, I think I said. Can’t remember. It was terrible. Worse than that amnesia story, definitely.’

Complete amnesia. Complete new personality. _If_ _I invite her over,_ Yaz said, _can you not make it weird? She won’t know why you’re staring at her, asking her weird questions. She’s been through a lot already. Don’t make it any worse for her._

She thinks it’s the worst lie she’s ever told them. Lying to her family. She’d understood the need to keep quiet about their trip to see her _ nani _ during the Partition, but this felt different, felt worse. This isn’t just her _ nani _’s personal history they’re blurring: it’s the Doctor’s, her family, her own.

She already hides so much away.

‘Did they buy it?’ she asks.

‘Yeah, apparently,’ Ryan says. His tone lowers. ‘Looked like it clicked with Cas especially.’

Yaz can imagine it would. She wonders how many times Cas has thought along similar lines to Ryan; how much he and his brothers wish they could have done something different. Who is to blame for a freak accident, a final unluckiness? Cas didn’t force their parents to go on that boat, but if he’d rebelled, if he’d kicked up a fuss—

They’ve all been through that thought process. It is one of the worst things about life: quite often, it is tragedy, not happiness, that pulls people together.

At least this time, Ryan’s story can end with happiness. That has happened to her best friend precious few times.

‘I keep thinking she'll just turn up,’ Ryan confesses. ‘Big smiles and all. “Off on another adventure?” she’ll ask, and we’ll go, stop all this waiting. All this… nothingness.’ His words take on a rhythm, a frustration building, and Yaz gets dragged into its beat. All the nothingness whipping around her, pressing on her chest. ‘I’m tired. I can’t sleep. I get mardy and I look out for Jane, and she’s not _ there _. She’s a ghost!’ He runs his down his face, then gestures in a helpless manner. Eyes wide, arms up, a frustration. ‘She’s a ghost!’

‘Don’t, Ryan!’ Yaz snaps, because it’s not just the wind like knives now, it’s the thought of what he’s saying, the thought that Ryan hasn’t intended to trigger. A whole life of waiting, the whisper of her death. All nothingness. It’s scared her in every single one of their predicaments together, but it has never been so desperate as now.

She has her own life, away from the Doctor. But she fears the Doctor’s death would smear it in grey, tear it apart. Run over it roughshod. The terror of it clutches at her heart, her hands, her lungs.

Chastised, Ryan lowers his arms. ‘Sorry. I’m sorry.’

The fear of it, bubbling up through her: an emptiness so full, so consuming, that she cannot stop its tide. Her fear bubbles up; and she’s dragged down.

‘I can’t stop looking for her,’ she trembles, her voice thick with it. ‘I can’t stop thinking about her.’ She sniffs. ‘God.’ Crosses her arms, hopes the shivering stops. It’s so cold now; she’s so cold up here. So removed from everything else, so submerged in this. ‘I don’t know what to do, Ryan. I don’t know what to do.’

‘We find Jane. We find the TARDIS – your plan,’ he insists. His voice stays level but something in her recognises the urgency. The police officer in her recognises it. She looks up at him again. His eyes are so big. Even when young, she’s always thought him to be kind.

She shakes her head. ‘No. No.’ She’s not quite sure what she means. ‘I don’t know what to do.’ The wave breaks. Her coat sleeves are salted.

‘C’mere, Yaz,’ Ryan implores, and she refuses at first, refuses, but his arms are out, and he looks so determined – so awkward, with his mouth pressed into a line in that British way, but so determined – that she relents. He knows she needs this.

And maybe he needs it too. It’s that thought that allows her to relax. Beckoned, she shuffles up on the rock until they have their arms wrapped tight around each other. Hands bundled in coat sleeves, noses chilled, Yaz’s tears making bitter tracks; amongst slate grey, brown ferns and persistent greens, and the life thriving down below.

* * *

Dried eyes. She drops Ryan off at the gym and responds in kind when he and Cas wave at her in thanks. Window down, moment over, she intends to drive around; not because she wants to, but because the evening demands it. She hears a scuffling at the side of the building, though, and her mind is occupied; her heart. It could be anything, she knows. It could be nothing.

She investigates, and a cat hisses at the intrusion. Defeated, Yaz returns to her car to collapse into it, slamming her head back on the seat headrest.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> this is possibly one of my favourite things i've ever written whoop whoop


	5. five: here's to you trying

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _and i'm no better than those i judge_
> 
> _with all my suffering_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> HAPPY DOCTOR WHO DAY!! happy birthday to the show that has kept me happy, kept me hopeful, kept me wondrous, for fourteen years. here's to many more!
> 
> on a side note, is anyone else filled a gripping anticipation ready for the s12 trailer in an hour? hhhhh i am....Inconsolable
> 
> for this chapter, i'd recommend listening to ['hell to the liars'](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KLzmsP7rmYs) by the sublime london grammar.
> 
> thank you once more to [ koraliss](https://archiveofourown.org/users/lieutenantsaavik) for betaing this chapter that very much needed it, and for being an absolutely ace human being in general

Exhaustion works through her on hot and cold days, when even the dread of unknowable waiting fails to keep her awake. Combined with long shifts, too, Yaz is only as strong as her body. Still, she would prefer to be asleep for longer than she is. (Time passes quicker that way; a quicker pace away from the abandonment, running instead towards the moment the Doctor returns.)

Exhaustion alternates its kindness, acting hot and cold when the ache comes regardless. Fitfulness and long hours spent staring at her phone, at the ceiling; the dread mounting, the memories haunting, until she cannot stand herself.

Four a.m., and her room is stuffed with all her thoughts. It is hard to breathe the little air that remains. She has to get out. Half-delirious, her newborn calf legs stand unsteady, grabbing onto her dresser in her stumble out of bed, before she can ready herself for the journey up ahead. She wakes up enough to drag herself to the door; to unhook the rose pink dressing gown from the back of the door and drape the robe over her silvery pyjamas; to thread her arms through and tie it around her shivering frame. Blinking to keep alert, her working of the door handle is the gentlest she can make it. The door opens incrementally. It creaks, giving Yaz cause to wince. Such thin walls in her home. She pauses, hearing her own breaths, letting the silence of the early morning wash over her.

At least the TARDIS, albeit a sentient being as it is, gave her more privacy.

But no one opens their door. No one peeks through to scold her for her audacity.

She regrets her lack of socks, but even in the indoor chill, she cannot be bothered to return to the corner of her room where her slippers lie, waiting to be picked up and neatly placed in their usual spot. So she pads, bare skin hitting cold, hard floor, to the kitchen. She is disturbed only by the hairs on her skin, triggered by the cooler air flowing in the nooks and crannies of her shape, past the collar of her dressing gown and down the back of her neck.

Walking to the counters, half-blind in the early morning half-light, she tries to clear the fog of her sleepless delirium. She wants – she wants a glass of water, she thinks. Yes, that’ll do. Escape; and a way to keep herself in the present. But when she lifts a hand to open the cupboard door, she is surprised to discover her fingers clasping the sonic screwdriver.

She blinks. She didn’t even notice.

She rests back on the counter, her shoulders slumped, turning the screwdriver over and over in hands working automatically. The soft glow and all it holds. Moving into different rooms has shaken off the cobwebs that come with returning to wearied thought patterns – but neither is she out of the woods.

Could she summon the TARDIS with this? Just a click of a button? It seems so easy, so obvious; after all, the screwdriver _ knows _her, doesn’t it?

Engine oil, and peppermint. Perhaps the echo of her lingers in the sonic screwdriver. Maybe the heat of the Doctor’s hands still exist in the atoms, the last residues of constant use; the Doctor’s constant kiss. Engine oil and peppermint – Yaz closes her eyes, and breathes in, conjuring the feel of the Doctor’s hands on the screwdriver. Pleading to feel her essential warmth.

She wants to feel her again, wants to be warmed by her. She’d do anything. She’s sick of waiting, anxious in it. They can’t even find Jane, haven’t found her despite it being a month. What good are they? She’s sick of it. She’d do anything.

She doesn’t know she’s crying again until the tears drop on the curve of her thumb. The splash is silent, but she hears it, keeps on listening out for other quiet things, impossible things: the whisper of a Time Lord in a lost fob watch.

Her breathing is punctuated by sobs.

‘Yaz?’

The sleep-soaked sound of her father’s voice sends her into a panic – she scrambles to banish the sonic screwdriver to the countertop behind her. It clinks against one of the jars left out from their gohst last night. She sniffs, wiping a hand across her nose, and clears her throat.

He switches on the kitchen lights, like floodlights, and Yaz turns her squinting eyes away from the sudden exposure. When she adjusts, she can see her dad come into view: ruffled, from his messy hair to his crumpled pyjamas, a plain black shirt and tartan shorts. He drags a fist across a sleepy eye – maybe she woke him. Nothing is hidden in the floodlights: the small roundness of his belly; the unkemptness of his beard, the silver whiskers shining.

‘Why are you – why are you up?’ she asks. She attempts to wipe her eyes, surreptitious intention blurred by the early hour, the bright lights.

She has done this too much recently.

He shrugs. ‘I haven’t had a normal sleeping pattern for a long time, sweetheart.’ He adds, through a yawn, ‘You’ll understand when you’re a parent.’

She scoffs. As if she doesn’t already know, with almost two years’ police training underneath her belt. But she’s in no position to nitpick.

His bare feet slap on the cold tile as he walks over to join her. His journey is slow, his hands reaching inside the cupboard deliberate. In these prolonged seconds, Yaz does her best to calm herself, keeping her sobs captive and holding them under until they drown.

Her father takes two glasses out from the cupboard. He puts them down on the counter. They are next to Yaz’s side. Glass cannot hide the truth. From his position, they would almost certainly enlarge the image of the sonic.

Yaz does not speak, drowning as she is.

Her father chooses not to fill the glasses with water yet. His arms are splayed out onto the counters, palms flat, his back bent over.

He sighs, a sound pressed down into his head, exhalation through his nose.

‘Your mother’s much better at this,’ he starts, finally switching his gaze from the empty glasses to his daughter. When she is brave – or stupid – enough to return it, she sees depths of confusion and concern that break her heart. ‘But you haven’t been sleeping lately, have you?’

Yaz blinks, looks away. The surge is unstoppable, but the wave never breaks. ‘Dad, I’m fine,’ she croaks. She sniffs automatically, and her heart plunges again. Now her words hold no weight – if, of course, they ever did.

‘Sweetheart,’ he says. Just a statement. Not a question, just a statement. 

‘Dad,’ is her answer. She knows – _ they _know – it is the verbal equivalent of Yaz crossing her arms and stomping a foot. But this time, there are tears in her eyes and her best friend is lost, immeasurably changed. There are layers to her life now, layers he’d never begin to fathom: new layers to her personality, her memories and thoughts; things she can no longer express in any tangible way to anyone who didn’t know. 

But one of them is lost.

And with that vital link gone, then how can she verbalise it? How can there be any way to put her hopes and fears into existence without acknowledging the otherness of them? If it weren’t for Ryan, she wouldn’t even know the Doctor. Her life would be so mundane. And now here she is. She has set herself apart from almost everything else she knows.

Her father, her _ dad_, is right there – staring at her like he can chase all the bad dreams from her mind. And she has never felt further away.

Landscapes uncrossable. Her dad grabs the empty glasses and moves away to the sink. Yaz hears the gush of water but doesn’t watch. She is too busy tightening her fingers into fists, fighting the urge to hold the sonic screwdriver. She wants to press on its metal curves until she finally detects a hint of that tender, alien warmth.

But he is back again, handing her a glass of water as if she did not shut him out a few seconds ago. He takes long gulps, one, two, three, four, and drinks the water up. He sets down his glass, frowns at the sharp thud.

She has sipped on hers, barely depleted the supply. It swirls in her glass, little forces creating little sensations.

‘Can I have a look?’ he asks. It makes Yaz look to him. He motions to the counter. ‘At that thing. You seem to like it.’

Thinking back to the video – she shouldn’t. It might implicate him. But he is already associated with her; with the Doctor, too. This can’t harm either of them anymore than it already has. She nods.

He gingerly picks it up with a thumb and his middle finger. It wobbles in the light hold. He almost drops it at first, a slight gush of air escaping his lungs as he catches it. But then his grasp is more secure; and he is taken in by it, his eyes alighting on something new. Perplexion, instead of concern, paints his face, and despite herself it makes Yaz smile at the odd sight before her.

‘What even is this?’ he mutters. The words are caught in a yawn.

‘It’s just a gift,’ she says. She tries to downplay it. ‘Just a contraption the Doctor made. She’s practical like that.’ A sniff. ‘Good at engineering, good at making th—don’t—don’t touch the button, Dad!’

He makes a face, at first an exaggerated look of surprise – then an apology. ‘Best you have it, then.’ Like transferring a sacred object from one worshipper to another, he hands it over to his daughter, the movement slow and deliberate. ‘You said it was a gift?’

As she takes the screwdriver, she wonders if her dad felt the hum of alien technology in his hands, the discreet power of other worlds. She wonders if he’ll ever question it. Maybe it’s just the right distance away, that acknowledgement of something new, that it has become more of a background occurrence than an urgent phenomenon. He took to the Doctor like a duck to water; was severely disappointed when she never ate his pakora. Perhaps they would be friends, if given the opportunity.

She wonders how he feels about the lie Yaz told them. If he knows it is a lie, or if this too is just a background occurrence, a new layer of obscurity she must wrap around herself.

Yaz nods. ‘Just before it went wrong, yeah. She… She wanted something for me to remember her by.’ They let her words hang in the air for a moment. Yaz strokes the cool metal with a thumb, watches the movement, pretends it is tender cream skin beneath her fingertip.

‘Would it jog her memory, d’you think?’ her dad suggests. ‘Get her back to normal? Or…’

She sniffs. ‘She’s a new person, Dad.’ Her voice breaks. ‘She’s a completely different person.’ Yaz looks up at her father again, and hearts shatter in unison. ‘She doesn’t know me anymore.’ And the wave breaks.

She’s in his arms as it crashes, the thunder of her ocean enough to drown out his reassurances but not enough to drown out the feel of his cradling. They do not hug in earnest, at least not often; moments like these are hard to come by, or abetted before they can come to pass. But she remembers the feeling of it like it was yesterday: her smaller self’s need for her dad’s safety, his comfort, his reassurance. His softer nature makes for moments dependent on gentleness; and in this moment, she depends on him.

Even if he’ll never understand, she depends on him.

Eventually, rough waters will calm, and let go of the force that whipped up such a storm. When she lifts her head from his chest, she glimpses her own tear stains. In sheer white light, they are two drips, evidence of the drowning. But only in sheer light; when he goes back to bed, they will be obscured.

With one arm still around her, he brushes the clump of hair stuck to the wetness of her cheek. ‘She’ll remember you eventually, won’t she?’ he reassures her. ‘And she’ll thank you for it, I bet you, ’cause I know you; you won’t let anything happen to her.’

‘Obviously not,’ she murmurs.

‘But you’ve got to look after yourself, y’know,’ her dad continues. ‘You’re not responsible for everyone, Yasmin, even though you think you are. You’re responsible for yourself. And you’re not sleeping.’

He lets go of her. He still has a gentle grasp of her shoulders, small reminders of heat; of safety. ‘I’m just your old dad and I don’t know anything, but at least I know you’re a Khan. We’re always trying to deal with everything on our own. Don’t do that to yourself, alright? Talk to me. Talk to your mum.’ He frowns. ‘Definitely talk to your mum; she won’t drop the gift like I almost did.’

It makes Yaz laugh, a quiet thing.

‘But don’t keep it in,’ her dad continues. He motions to the screwdriver in her hand. ‘Appreciate what you have in the meantime. Sweetheart, it’s so easy to forget just how loved you are.’

The starkness of the early morning is settling into his face, greying his colour and deepening the bags under his eyes. His soft smile, tinged by the concern in his eyes, is interrupted by another yawn.

He struggles to keep it in, but Yaz’s laugh gives him free rein to deal with it. When they quiet, she hugs him again. ‘Thanks, Dad.’

He leaves with little more passed between them, just the pleasantries of going back to bed. And that is fine. She has aired out the airless space from which she escaped, and though her thoughts followed her into the kitchen, at least they have been lured away from her bedroom. She refills her cup with water and takes it back with her; sets it next to the sonic screwdriver on her dresser. She’ll be tired, she knows – but she won’t be going mad with it.

She pulls the sunflowers up to her chin and thinks of the way her dad held the sonic screwdriver. Something precious, but something she knew more intrinsically. She thinks of the sonic, too: the soft glow and all it holds.

* * *

Dark tries to linger, the dawn suppressed until now. In the depths of winter, February has not lifted her cloak to the brave. Humanity coped for centuries by lighting fires, defiant in their ability to conjure at will the light and heat the sky had so cruelly stolen from them. Nowadays, modernity aids the thief. The theft is no longer so personal. It is taken for granted that those who step outside must swaddle themselves in layers of coats and jumpers, if not to find relief in the heaters of their transport. Light conjurers are outsourced, removed and cold. They are not so brave now.

But the dawn has clawed back the hours from winter, the sunrise edging up before seven a.m., and it gives Yaz no small sense of relief.

The dawn is still young when Yaz steps out. There is no sun today, hidden already by the clouds that gathered at the first whisper of the impending morning; there is no sun to heat up the chill leaking into the soles of her trainers. Why did she choose trainers? Her toes will be numb. She thinks of the unforgiving ground and shivers.

The journey will be long this morning, to the other side of town. Perhaps catching the bus will lift her spirits. She doesn’t know. After the night she has had, she doesn’t hold out much hope. In her left hand she grips onto the bag her mum needs delivering to her sister, Yaz’s _ masi_. Maybe seeing Maisha and the tykes will lighten her mood. Maybe. She lets it drop to the floor, and the sound of it echoes down the corridor. She remembers the contents – the photo album her mum has slaved over these past two nights – and winces.

So much for cheering up.

She makes it worse, focusing on the exposed cold of her metal key as she locks the door of her flat. Even through her red leather gloves, she feels it: the residue warmth pressing onto the metal. She imagines the heat seeping through to the atoms, giving it a new excitement. Enough heat and the atoms would jostle, meld, melt, and lock her out. She’d have no choice but to face the coming wind, the overcast clouds; and the grey – the constant grey.

She is quick to stuff her keys into her pocket, to snatch up the bag. And move off.

* * *

Everything is observable, but she can never fully process it – in part, because she has already acknowledged it before. Not this exact bus route, on this exact day, not these exact strangers – but all of these components that make a whole journey. Is it enough to be a unique moment? She doesn’t think so. She has grown up in this city: she knows the appearance of these roads, how they look when dampened, in shadow. She knows what skeleton trees look like, how their blur makes the grey sky partially black. She knows the anonymity of strangers, how masses become as unimportant as individuals. How individuals become as important as masses.

A woman, pram, and her child running free; an old man falling asleep; a young man wearing earphones. They could be everyone; and in it, they are no one. 

Bus drivers have veered across the roads and will again. Life will keep perpetuating itself. The sky could fall down, and the bus would still run. Maybe it should, she thinks.

Almost three weeks. It has been almost three weeks now. Three weeks without the Doctor. With February’s end in sight, she feels she is loosening herself from her initial panic, and finding herself in a familiar settling feeling. That comforting sense of returning home – but not staying. She has felt it before, in periods of time between adventures when the Doctor more or less landed them back in Sheffield on the right day. That relief of return compounded with an anticipation of temporality – she’ll take it.

A month gone, and, at a minimum, a month to go. If she can balance on this tightrope between relief and anticipation, then she will survive it. She can perpetuate her own coping. She can do it. She can do it.

She can keep telling herself she can do it.

It was nice this morning to be plunged into the normality – the madness – of her family, before her shift brings her back to the coldness of the rest of the world. But Maisha has always known how to make Yaz feel relaxed – at least, as relaxed as one can be around three toddlers learning the joy of irritating their _ bhenji_. Pulled hairs and interrogations from two-year-olds: it has been the most fun Yaz has had for at least a week or two.

She could forget herself. Pretend she was just Yaz again, dropping off something for her _ masi _and staying for tea. She could lose herself in the act of leafing through the photo album with Maisha, pointing out her mother’s ridiculous expressions as a child, amongst the 70s haircuts and masses of unrecognisable faces. She could wonder if this is what she and Sonya would do, in ten, twenty years’ time; huddle together round a cup of tea and giggle over selfies like schoolchildren.

And maybe they will. But she can’t know until it happens – or doesn’t. She no longer has a TARDIS to try it.

In those near-dreamy moments at her _ masi’s_, she could push aside her adventures, and pretend she and Sonya will chat freely about their lives, instead of pushing down the secrecy of it. There is so much she wishes she could say. So much more than Sonya has been clued into.

With Maisha, she could distract herself.

Strangers with more than a thousand different faces pass by the bus window. She does not glance at them. Trees and homes hunkered down together, huddled against the winter: she does not notice them. She sighs on the glass, creating a thin layer of condensation to obscure what she has already seen more than a thousand times before.

In the opaqueness of her breath, she indulges herself. Her fingertip constructs a rectangle. She draws doors, windows aligned to the top of the rectangle. A smaller rectangle on the roof. In the middle, to the left, a sign. She shades in the blue paint and doodles lines emanating from the roof light, comic-like. A beacon of hope: fictional for some but real to her.

Can the image of something become it? She’s heard that before, whispered down her history in abstract philosophies and serious theologies; in desperation, dedication, and hope. She hopes, too, that it can. It’s not that she should need it; it’s just that she does.

Still. She stares at the doodle.

A tap on her shoulder – she jumps. When she turns around to confront whoever had the audacity to disturb her – someone who wasn’t even sitting next to her, someone who sandwiched themselves between the two rows of seats, without her noticing – she comes face to face with a little boy. Five, or maybe six years old. Thin round glasses and golden cropped hair on his almost oblong head. There is an angry scab on his forehead, and a rip in the sleeve of his primary school jumper. He snorts, then wipes his runny nose on his sleeve.

Yaz instantly calms. ‘You scared me a bit there!’ She smiles.

He doesn’t answer at first, twisting the top half of his body around to peer at his mum further down the bus. Yaz can see another scab, or a mole, at the back of his neck, right in the centre. The mum, absent-mindedly moving the pram back and forth with one hand, motions to her son to keep talking. 

His attention swivels back to Yaz. ‘What you drawing?’ he asks, each word punctuated with a nervousness belying a small excitement.

Did he watch the whole thing? How long was he even there for, snorting and sniffing, entirely unbeknownst to her? How did she not notice?

It doesn’t matter, not now. She’s not the priority. On the spot, she has to mask the true nature of her gloom, and the doodle that produced it. But she’s good under pressure.

‘Have you seen the green police box outside the town hall?’

He nods, hesitantly.

She makes a point to look at her surroundings, before leaning closer in. The boy copies, his attention rapt. They’re nearly nose to nose. He sniffs loudly.

‘You mustn’t tell anyone this,’ Yaz starts.

His nods are significantly more eager now.

‘It’s not just a police box,’ she whispers loudly. ‘It’s actually a spaceship.’

He gasps. When he speaks, she can barely hear the sound above the awe that encompasses him. ‘Really?’

She nods. ‘Oh, yeah. It’s very secret, though. It’s shut most of the time, but that’s because it’s waiting for its next pilot. When it finds someone it likes, it’ll open its doors for you. And then you can fly around the universe!’

There are a thousand worlds playing in the boy’s eyes; a whole universe of the unknown. Joy is pulsing off him, like waves, like an invitation to a new beginning, and Yaz lives for it. She _ remembers _it – that first step inside the TARDIS, knowing all of history existed at her fingertips; knowing the unknowable future was waiting to be revealed. All of imagination and its real-life counterpart existing together because of this one ship.

‘And that’s that?’ He lifts a finger at the crude reenactment etched into the condensation.

Yaz shrugs, and leans back into her seat. ‘Yeah. But to everyone else, it’s just a green police box.’

‘But it’s not just that!’ He almost-jumps, his excitement barely containable. It is that young-child thing that Yaz has observed many times before, in countless children playing on streets and in her littlest relatives. The wedding night of many years ago comes to the fore of her mind, herself small and Sonya smaller. Little Sonya’s dynamic nature; so bright and bursting then. 

Her smile widens. ‘Exactly.’

He retracts his pointing finger, and uses the nearby sleeve to wipe at his nose again. ‘Can you go to the Unicorn?’ he wonders. ‘The one in the stars.’

He means Pegasus, she realises, the constellation. ‘Of course.’

‘Can you visit the Moon?’

‘Definitely,’ she answers, ‘but you’ll need a jumper, ’cause it’s very chilly there.’

‘Oh, I’ll wear my best jumper,’ he reassures her, crossing his arms and placing his palms on his elbows. He sniffles. ‘It’s my comfiest jumper, but it’s my nicest jumper too. Mummy says it’s smart, and I want to look smart in case we meet the Clangers that Mummy says live there.’

Yaz laughs. ‘I’m sure they’d appreciate that!’

They spend the rest of their time together drawing the ship together – Yaz teaching him, the boy concentrating very hard. He has clambered onto the seats in front of her in order to have a large enough canvas on the window. From there, she can bend down and point at where the components need to go. His ship is a mostly faithful reproduction, but a lot larger, a lot wobblier. 

She never calls it the TARDIS. Why would she? He’s never known it, and perhaps never will. To him, it is something more, something new, his own creation. Shaped inextricably by something he cannot know, it is unique yet not. In his head, he has painted it green by wiping away the traces of his breath; in her head, she has painted hers blue. 

Her heart thumps for reasons he’ll never know.

The boy is called by his mum as the bus screeches to a stop. They need to get off here. Unwilling, but resigned to it, he thanks Yaz for spending time with him before his mum makes him, and all three depart – boy, baby and mother.

Yaz watches them leave, feeling a little kinder about the thousand-face strangers. Then the bus resumes its lurch to the next destination, and three become more than a thousand, faceless again. The young man at the front of the bus scratches the back of his neck and Yaz remembers the mum calling the boy by his name, John.

Her heart thumps at a recollection she can never forget. It makes her ache, a grief the boy will never know.

* * *

_ Graham (10:13): On the off chance that you’re free for about half an hour...Would you be up for joining me on a walk…..Would be nice to chat? _

_ Yaz Khan (10:14): Yes, that sounds lovely, Graham! Should be at yours in about fifteen minutes _

_ Yaz Khan (10:15): I’ll message you when I’m outside _

_ Graham (10:17): Great see you then _

* * *

The bus lurches and Yaz’s head snaps up, her organs reassembling themselves as the fog of sleep dissipates into thin air. Blinking against the grey, she recalibrates herself. Bus. John. TARDIS. Graham. Oh, God, has she missed her stop?

A quick peek out the window settles her spiking heartbeat: she is just arriving onto Graham’s street. She presses urgently on the red ‘STOP’ button clamped onto the pole in front of her. She waits patiently for the bus to screech to a halt by stretching out her back, trying to offset the deep ache her hunched nap has since inflicted. She hears a couple of pops from her spine and only just manages to stop herself from sighing in the bliss of it.

Aside from the guy with the earphones, she’s the only other person on here. Vaguely, she wonders who he is; what he’s listening to; whether it even matters. In her mind’s eye, the frames flicker between memories Earth-bound and alien, the people she swears to protect in her every waking moment. The solitary people, the ones caught up in the chaos that the four of them try in earnest to sort out – the Willa Twistons of their own planets.

The leftover forces of the bus’ halt force them to lurch forward; Yaz grabs onto the pole, and keeps her eyes trained on the only other passenger. Beneath the seat, she can see his foot tap in a speedy rhythm. If he were to become embroiled in their adventures, she wonders, who would he be? The help or hindrance? The watcher?

With a hiss, the bus doors flatten against themselves. Yaz hops up and disembarks, thanking the driver without thought. She is left in the fumes of the mammoth vehicle quite suddenly, and caught up in the cold air welcoming her back outside. When she looks after the bus, she sees the man with earphones turn his head away from her.

* * *

Graham is already suited up for the great outdoors by the time Yaz knocks on his door. But for the grandfatherly concern emanating from him in waves, and the plastic bag stuffed with clothes resting on his left arm, this would be but a group walk back to the TARDIS; a step into the next adventure.

‘Hiya, Yaz,’ he greets her, chipper despite the hour. It is borne, mostly, out of politeness, but Yaz feels relief blossoming in her, like a sigh, from seeing his face again. It’s been at least a week.

‘Morning,’ she smiles. She waits as Graham ducks his head back to shout to Ryan of their intentions. No reply comes.

‘Dead to the world,’ Graham marvels, ‘absolutely dead to the world.’ The door shuts behind him, and he fumbles with the lock before turning to Yaz. ‘Ready?’

‘Absolutely.’

Close enough to catch attention, and far away enough not to encroach, the inner city provides their backdrop for the first minute of their walk. Their small talk populates the damp air as they walk, but Yaz finds she keeps looking back to the landscape. In her periphery, she can see Graham noticing, but she can’t stop it. It keeps pulling her back. Every time a train passes, so close to them on this side of the city and just a little closer on this road, she catches herself wondering about Jane. Too late, too long, too far away.

For a man partial to wisecracks, Graham is just as settled in amiable silences. He is unlike most of the jokers Yaz knows in that way. As they walk – as Yaz watches – he keeps his chin buried in his West Ham scarf, his gloved hands plunged fully in his pocket. His bag returns with each stride to crash against his left leg, but it is not enough for him to sacrifice the warmth of his pocket; not at the moment, at least.

‘Looking out for her?’ he asks, four minutes after leaving the sight of the inner city behind.

The orderliness of suburbia has partly given way to the orderliness of constrained nature, a wall of trees and evergreen bushes barricading them from the fields to their right. Some of the branches brush her coat as she passes by, but she ignores them.

She is not expecting to hear Graham’s voice, but when she focuses on him, he is staring back. Busted.

‘What gave you that idea?’

‘’Cause I do the same,’ he says. ‘I’m always looking out for her. Helps that I’m in town a lot anyway, y’know, giving myself something to do. But I’m doing a double take at every bloomin’ blonde woman I see.’

It makes Yaz laugh. ‘Tell me about it. Every blue box, every blonde woman. Every trip away from my house is a heart attack waiting to happen.’

‘Ryan ain’t convinced you not to find the TARDIS, then?’

Ah, yes, Yaz thinks. This conversation. She shakes her head. ‘It’s been a month, Graham, and we’re no closer to being able to defend ourselves then we were at the start.’ She steps over a puddle, but her heel catches the edge, and a little _ splash _follows her. ‘I feel like we’ve wasted so much time already.’

‘But it’s like the Doctor said, her potential—’

‘Possibility,’ Yaz corrects.

‘—Yeah, her possibility energy is still out there, right? But all this time, with Jane roamin’ around, it’s been getting lost in the noise.’ He shrugs. ‘We may end up not even needing to defend ourselves if the Lannister lot ain’t bothered about Earth. And I tell you what, Yaz, I’d much prefer that to be the case.’

Yaz raises an eyebrow at him. ‘Have you been watching Game of Thrones?’

Graham is none the wiser. ‘Eh?’

‘Never mind.’ Yaz dismisses the thought. Maybe it’s too gory for him; she’ll have to ask Ryan. She brushes the tangential thought away, and routes back to her main point. ‘We can’t be unprepared. I can’t relax until I know we’re safe – until Jane is safe. I don’t want to fail the Doctor.’

‘I know, Yaz; I know,’ Graham nods, because none of them want to fail her.

His pause lengthens, and they settle back into the walk. The wall of trees end and they are thrust fully into suburbia now, with all of its perfectly ordinary people living in perfectly ordinary homes. Vaguely and quietly, Yaz makes a note to double back round to fields sometime, to explore them a little more. Wayward adventures as a little kid have meant she knows the green spaces around Park Hill, especially those closer to the other school some of her childhood friends went to. But it has been a long time, and now she has the chance to.

‘What are you gonna say when Doc finds out you wanted to find the TARDIS?’ Graham wonders.

The consequence of it hits her, as unexpected as Graham’s question. She brings her scarf up closer to her chin, shielding herself. The guilt pools, and her intakes of breath are a little harder; a little sharper in the biting air. ‘I haven’t thought about what I want to say,’ she lies.

She has thought about it – thought it to death. The dialogue always changes; she ranges from betrayal to regret to joy, a fizzing joy that threatens to outshine the Doctor herself. (Not that it ever could.) Always, though, there is a current of relief running through the hypothesised conversations, whether steeped in guilt or not.

On the topic of the TARDIS, though, and the guilt that comes from it, Yaz is ready to defend herself. The Doctor sent _ her _ the USB. Graham and Ryan looked to _ her _. She doesn’t have the Doctor’s brain, or the resources she normally has. She’s had to make do.

That is what she’ll say. _ I had to make do, without you. Sorry, Doctor, but you didn’t exactly give us much choice. We were running blind. _

Staggering blind, more like.

The rhythmic thump of the bag against Graham’s side has stopped – it is this absence of a steady beat that prompts Yaz to turn around, to see her friend having halted his stride. And watching her, his eyebrows raised.

‘Graham…’ she sighs.

‘You’re telling me the Doc’s best friend – her right-hand woman – ain’t thought about what she’ll say to the Doc when she comes back?’

‘Please don’t,’ she responds, and she can see his next words die on his lips.

Instead, his expression changes.

She knows he’s looking out for her – knows that at this point, he is practically her adopted granddad – but she is not here to mope about the woman who left them. 

She can cope. She has been coping. She can cope.

‘Seriously, Yaz. Are you doing alright?’

Her mind gifts her with flashes of the early morning; crying into her dad’s arms. Yaz swallows. ‘I’m okay, Graham, really. Or… I will be.’

She can _ cope_.

She does not offer more, not right now, because she is here to listen to him and his life – not the other way around. This, she will make sure of.

Rerouting the conversation is not difficult now they have resumed their pace. The beat of the bag against Graham’s leg, returned as if uninterrupted, prompts her to ask what is inside. His text, after all, left much to be desired in the way of information.

‘Ah, it’s just… old things,’ he admits with a sigh. The quiet has crept into his voice. ‘Things we didn’t need anymore, things us two couldn’t wear.’ The bag swings into view; out of the corner of her eye, Yaz glimpses leopard print, greyed out by the film of the plastic bag carrying it. She is reminded of the flower mug. ‘No point in it collecting dust in my old place. And it makes sense, don’t it, what with me doing that sorta thing more.’

‘Like what?’ Yaz is thankful for the attention on Graham. ‘Charity?’

‘Yeah, yeah.’ Graham smiles at Yaz’s own smile. ‘It’s something to do, ain’t it? Donating to the food bank every now and then, that sorta thing. I just thought – all that we’ve seen, Yaz, it does put things into perspective sometimes. And, well, I’ve got the time now.’

Another acknowledgement – how quickly lives change. Grace’s passing is not old news, not by any means, but most of the time to process passed on other worlds; the linear acknowledgement, back down on Earth, has kept a heavier gravity.

‘Ryan said you were getting bored being at home,’ Yaz notes. ‘Something about… “terrible cooking”?’

Graham is gobsmacked, and Yaz laughs at his open mouth. ‘He told you that? Cheeky bugger! Is that why he’s cooking more?’

Yaz shrugs. ‘Maybe it’s a good thing then?’ she wonders.

Graham nods. ‘Yeah, get him more independent. Used to be an absolute nightmare, y’know, trying to get him in that kitchen,’ he reminisces. ‘Always insisted that Grace’s cooking was too good. Didn’t wanna miss out.’ Graham chuckles. ‘He was right, too. Though I’m still a little offended, mind.’

Yaz grins. ‘He means well.’

Conversation meanders, then, as does their path. They get further and further away from the point at which Yaz was meant to depart, but once she realises it, she also realises she doesn’t care. All this time, and she still has not managed to have quality time with Graham – not like this, at least. She will grip onto it for as long as she can. Even if it means a quick jog back home.

She broaches the topic of ‘The Dog’, and all the importance Ryan has given it in their frequent conversations. Graham’s hesitance makes sense – ‘What on Earth are we gonna do with another living being when we’re back with the Doc on the TARDIS? I’m not sure Doris next door will take too kindly to being an unexpected dogsitter…’ – but it is clear that the idea has rooted and taken hold. Graham is one bad decision away from naming the dog ‘Bessie’, much to Ryan’s vocal chagrin, and the thought of it makes Yaz laugh out loud. Bessie the British bulldog; she can see that happening. She can see herself teasing Ryan relentlessly about his moping, too.

Whatever they name their dog, Yaz knows Graham will care for it. She knows how tender he can be. At the very least, it gives him an excuse to be out of the house more, making friends.

‘’Cause one of my bus mates – “Nutty Terry,” he’s called, cause he’s a bit of a conspiracy theorist nowadays – he loves greyhounds, has got five of ’em, and if he’s not talking about aliens then he’s talking about his pups,’ Graham explains. ‘And he’s been the one I’ve had a few drinks with, on a Sunday sometimes when Ryan’s up in his room playing his games.’ So that’s why he’s been unavailable, Yaz thinks, when I’ve texted him these last few Sundays. ‘He’s been encouraging me like nobody’s business. Good for distraction, he says – and to be fair to him, he’s been on his own for three years now, so I s’pose he knows what he’s talking about.’ 

‘He’s an alien enthusiast?’ she picks up on. She nudges his arm with her elbow. ‘He’s not too different to us, then, is he?’

‘That’s the thing!’ Graham crows. ‘We got all this knowledge about the universe and he’s off talking about them little green ones! D’you know how many times I’ve had to stop myself from interjecting, ’cause he’s so close to the truth? Bloody nightmare, it is, Yaz, it really is. God, the things we could tell him. He’d have a field day.’

Yaz almost wants to ask, ‘Why don’t you?’ but she immediately halts that thought. They know why.

Graham frowns down at the ground as the terrain lurches downwards. They walk, slanted, onto the open land, turning their back on the perfectly designed clumps of human civilisation. Up ahead, the trees placed in the back-end of the church park watch from a distance. Few and far between, they are keenly aware of their sparseness, of how much is let through. Yaz’s and Graham’s path through the park takes them closer, puts the trees under scrutiny, and in one of them, Yaz spots a robin. She heard it chirping when they broke away from the housing estate – but now they are too close, and the birdsong is replaced by the flapping of wings to fill the wintry air.

‘Terry could be helpful,’ Yaz suggests tentatively, ‘even if he doesn’t know.’

‘And implicate him with them aliens?’ Graham counters.

Yaz can feel his grimace, even if she can’t see it. ‘He’s already implicated, because he’s friends with you,’ she reasons, regretting her words immediately when she looks up at her friend to see the guilt flash across his face. ‘I’m sorry, Graham, but at least he can be useful like this.’

‘Like he ain’t now?’ Graham retorts, ‘for me?’

It winds her.

This is the problem with having such a narrow focus, she knows. Buried in her own grief, and her own determination, the little things tend to fall away. Talking to Ryan has brought _ his _life more into focus – his frustration at the warehouse, his excitement around his friends again – but Graham has been around in the periphery, not at the forefront – despite her best wishes.

Her best self, on a better day, would know about Graham’s loneliness. Her best self would have been happy for him first and foremost, not worried about the dangers. And now she has put those dangers into his head, tarring his friendship with Terry.

It winds her.

But she pushes it down. The dangers are still there.

‘You know what I mean,’ she answers gently.

Graham sighs.

‘Yeah. Yeah, I do.’

On the church grounds, there is a slight respite from the sounds of the city. But confronted with the B-road, they are left to contend with the roar returning to volume. Cars rush by, one after the other in quick succession. They take no notice of anything but themselves, and demanding everything else take notice. Yaz’s mind flits back to the solitary robin. So exposed, so fearful. She understands that retreat to safety. Perhaps it went back to the fields they walked parallel to; perhaps she could, too.

Another time. She slows her pace to stop at the road, knowing she will head left, back on herself, while Graham will plough forward. Hands in her coat pockets, huddled in herself, Graham could be forgiven for misreading her crumpled expression as a protection against the wind and the grey. She would prefer it if he did, in fact. And yet.

Graham’s brow is creased as he contemplates Yaz’s suggestion. All the lines of age solidify that image of scepticism. But he means well, of course he does; far from feeling intimidated, as cynicism often encourages, Yaz feels endeared. It is often a good thing, she knows, to want to protect the innocent – a friend, a stranger – from the harms of the unknown, particularly in this extraterrestrial life they lead.

First the TARDIS. And now Nutty Terry? She feels so guilty, and so scared of making the wrong decisions. She doesn’t want to fail any of them, and she is so, so scared of it.

‘You do have a point,’ Graham admits. Yaz breathes a silent sigh of relief. ‘He could be helpful, give us any information on those sites of his. But any sign of that Lannister—’

‘Limina.’

‘—lot, then we have to make sure he’s safe. The Doc wouldn’t want him in danger.’

Can she backtrack on her suggestion? Should she? ‘Of course,’ she agrees.

They watch the cars pass by for a few moments. Wary of time, Yaz wonders whether she should leave.

But Graham clears his throat. ‘I can’t stand the thought of him being hurt. I don’t want him to be like Prem, or that Kiera lass. She was – she was full of life – and Terry’s my mate, y’know, he’s a bit of a laugh.’ His nose red, he sniffs in the cold air. ‘I think of ’em all the time. Even that Becka Savage.’

‘Me too,’ Yaz says. At night; when she thinks of Grace when she thinks of the Doctor. The places they have in her head, nestled between her lungs. Especially Prem. The thought of him leaves a twisting feeling, a gutting feeling, even now. ‘Always.’

‘Let’s not add Terry to that list, then, eh?’

‘Definitely not,’ Yaz says, and at Graham’s sad smile, his resignation of what neither of them can ensure, she tries not to make it sound like a promise.

* * *

Yaz arrives for work with ghosts haunting her thoughts. She can feel them follow her, taking up space behind her, around her, as she dumps her stuff in her locker and readies herself for her shift. She can feel them slip through the door, spreading out into the room as she passes by the rows of computers her colleagues are huddled in front of.

It is an old building. The cold is getting to her colleagues, even though there are humming machines generating heat, but the ghosts are not disturbed by notions of warmth. They traipse between the rows, peering over shoulders that can’t notice them; some of them blinking, mystified, at technology far beyond their world’s understanding; some of them blinking, mystified, at technology much too primitive for them to understand. Yaz does sometimes wonder how they would cope if the roles were reversed, and it was Dan, or Becka, or Astos, who landed in different times.

Would they cling to ignorance or excitement? There was never the chance to find out. But it helps, sometimes, to imagine the dead still accompanying her. Memories are the last hope for the lost.

In the middle of the room, Yaz notices PC Evans finally get her computer working again. She smiles, setting off a chain reaction of relief and joy amongst her nearest colleagues, and Yaz is reminded of Kiera.

Sunder is engaged on the phone, holding a hand up when she walks up to the briefing room door. Yaz is more relieved than she should be. She takes this opportunity to dive into the break room, for a moment’s peace before battling with Sunder yet again. Like smoke, the ghostly figures following her disperse at once, puffballs of lingering grief dissipating around the door of the kitchen, to revisit another time. They will occupy her in the future – of course they will – but in the present, Tan is boiling the kettle, and Yaz’s heart is singing at the thought of a cup of tea.

‘Are you genuinely happy to see me, or are you after a brew?’ he asks, and his face splits into a smile when she laughs.

‘Both,’ she says, ‘I promise.’

As Tan brings down another mug from the cupboard – as much as he tries to prevent it, the old wood of the cupboard door makes a sound like a gunshot as it closes, and they both wince – Yaz takes the opportunity to lean against the counter. For a moment, the early morning’s events flash into her mind, and it triggers a yawn, but she does her best to dismiss the memory. These beige counters are not the counters of her home. Still, the image of the sonic screwdriver refuses to disappear. She wants to hold it, press down on it. Vaguely, a kettle boils.

‘You just starting your shift?’ Tan questions, bringing her back to the room. He pauses at the cluster of teas and coffees supplied by the force, hesitating over the PG Tips once, twice, before choosing the coffee. Getting the container open is a nightmare, but it is a secret talent of his. The bright orange lid pops open obediently, and he spoons a significant amount into his mug.

‘Yeah. Hiding out here to warm up. No doubt Sunder’ll send me out on patrol again.’ The kettle reaches a crescendo, bubbles voracious, until it pops off. The quiet it leaves behind is marked, until Yaz interrupts it. ‘You?’

Tan grimaces. ‘Halfway.’ Yaz pulls a sympathetic face, and he chuckles. ‘Tea or coffee?’

‘Tea, thanks.’ When she sees where Tan’s hand is reaching, she clarifies, ‘Yorkshire, please.’

Tan corrects his mistake. ‘Reppin’,’ he grins.

‘Don’t you know it.’ Only then does she notice he has picked out the rose pink mug, Yaz’s unabashed favourite.

For once, the fridge has been stocked with milk, so Yaz can enjoy something other than a black tea for the first time this week. Tan declines the milk, citing a long report ahead. It is the last thing they say for a minute or so, standing in silence to blow on their mugs and pretend it is warming them up. Still, at least they’re not in the main office.

She takes in the dullness of the break room; the wooden floor, off-white walls. Not out of place in a community hall, she thinks, or a school. It is almost amusing to think that some of her best conversations have not happened on patrol but in this room: this boring, cramped space.

Tan breaks the silence with an anecdote about his mother. Her candidness, famed the world over, has made her a new friend at work. Now they conspire together, Tan says, to shoot down a colleague’s latest hare-brained plan sure to go wrong. Yaz listens, attentive as possible, and laughs at all the right moments. (She’d love to meet Mrs Wu someday.)

It is the best she can do around him; even after nearly a month, she feels permanently on the back foot, as if he is waiting for her to catch up. That would make sense; it is Yaz’s situation, not Tan’s, that has caused her to fall behind. Although that space must frustrate him, too, he can’t help but be patient about it. 

Maybe by the end of this, it’ll be more natural again. But then Yaz will fly off in the TARDIS and they’ll be back to square one. It isn’t fair on him.

Or Tomasz, or Maisie.

The swallow of her tea is uncomfortable. These are things she has had too much time to think about. No easy solution, either. So it is best not to think.

His innocuous question – ‘So how have you been?’ – comes with pitfalls. But she has had practice, asking herself: how much truth can she inject into her answer? She does not want to lie to Tan – she hates lying to him – but again, it is not like she can divulge on true intentions. ‘Meeting up, going shopping,’ sounds plausible. ‘Meeting up to look for the TARDIS,’ sounds ridiculous. ‘Going to Meadowhall to look for a woman who doesn’t know we exist’? Downright barmy.

So she goes for the former, and hates how easy the omission is. Practised and perfect, to protect the identity of a woman they have not yet found. In these moments, she thinks it’d be relieving to confess everything.

But so utterly stupid.

‘Nothing much, just shopping, really,’ she decides on, and that is an easy concept for Tan to understand. They are both police officers-in-training. Considering the hours they work, having not much else happening in their lives can be pretty by-the-by. But the silence rings with the absence in her offerings, and it makes her uncomfortable. She adjusts her position leaning against the counter, and clears her throat, pushing on regardless. ‘Met up with a couple of friends. Visited my aunt this morning.’ She smiles to herself as a memory pops up – finally, something a little more concrete. ‘Made friends with a little kid on the bus too.’

‘Aw.’ Through a gulp of his coffee, Tan says, ‘That’s very you.’

Yaz can only offer a small, ‘Oh,’ as she searches for something to say. She feels the unexpected pride go through her, as warm as the tea she drinks.

Despite this, the pause is too lengthy for it to be comfortable, safe. And still – why is it so difficult for her to continue the conversation on?

‘Yeah, of course,’ he jumps in, saving them from the silence, and she is heartened to see his brows pull together in the absolution of his statement. ‘I know we don’t – we don’t often get personal with each other – not _ really _personal, anyway. But I think you’re the best of us, Yaz.’ Sipping from his coffee, he lets the compliment hang in the air. ‘To be honest, I think that’s why Suner puts you on patrol so much.’

Yaz scoffs, her cheeks a little warm with the praise. ‘No, that’s because he doesn’t want to have to deal with my questions.’

‘_And, _ maybe,’ he counters, ‘it’s because you’re reliable. Capable. You’re the only one of the “Fantastic Four”—’ he makes speech marks with his hand not currently cradling his grey-and-blue mug ‘—who’s even got to _ participate _in a pursuit, never mind lead it.’ Her heart drops. ‘I’m just saying; it’s not easy to keep your head in new situations. But you do.’

She knows he is trying to be kind – to be good, to offer her a hand and bring her along – so her cheeks are wide at the compliment, reassured. Safe. She just wishes she could believe him, totally and fully.

Pursuing the stolen car? Yes, she kept her head. But that night was as much a failure as it was a success. She is still grappling with the emotional fallout of it.

But she’s fine. She can _ cope_.

‘Thanks,’ she smiles, and hides her voice in her mug.

She is saved by the door to kitchen bursting open. With such an entrance, there is only one culprit: Maisie. Yaz quickly takes in the sight of her friend before her: the crumpled police uniform; the hair starting to resemble a bird’s nest; last night’s makeup still on her face.

‘Maisie!’ Tan crows, standing up more fully against the counter. ‘You’re alive!’

‘You bet.’ Maisie becomes a little more serious as she turns to Yaz; she kicks the door away from her and folds her arms as it comes back to rest against her leaning form. Quietly, her foot taps. ‘Unfortunately, Sunder’s put us on patrol, so he wants us to go, like now. Fortunately, Sunder’s put us _ both _ on patrol, so at least I can tell you all the good stuff. Tan, I promise I _ will _update you later.’

‘My shift finishes at 4.’

Yaz is blinking at her in confusion, her eyebrow raised.

‘Hmm.’ Maisie pauses. ‘I’ll message you it, then.’

‘You know that’s not the same,’ Tan complains lightly. He cannot keep the slight smile from his face – a consequence of being around her. It is a natural occurrence, Yaz knows, because they all do it too.

The devastation on Maisie’s face mirrors Tan’s own exaggerated pout. ‘I’m sorry, hun.’ She slaps a hand on her chest. ‘The world clearly does not want us to be together.’

Ah. It finally clicks. She can’t believe she forgot it – until the memory of Graham comes creeping back in, his image floating in front of her mind's eye. The hurt on his face: _ Like he ain’t now, for me? _

Yaz breathes in; ignores the shake of it.

‘High school reunion went well, then?’

* * *

‘That was _ weird_, right? Him being so nice like that?’ Maisie asks. Her head dips as she takes a sip from her coffee. The green straw pings out from her mouth, splattering the dashboard with drops of creamy latte, and she grimaces. ‘Fuck, sorry.’ She darts forward to wipe the evidence off.

Maisie moves so much that Yaz wonders if she is ever still. Probably not, she thinks. Every glance she’s taken, every now and then, to see her friend in the passenger seat, has given her the same conclusion: Maisie is a fidgeter at the best of times. Even exhausted, even resting, there is some part of her that is always moving. Her drink bracketed by her left hand, her right hand moves over her own thigh, fingers performing an intricate dance shielded from even her own consciousness.

Chatting with Maisie is vastly different to her conversations with Tan – so much so that it gives Yaz whiplash, sometimes. Being able to contribute is almost a secondary function of the conversation Maisie leads. Most of the time, it is best to just listen, and pick up on the cues Maisie flings out with abandon. Far from being the wall Maisie needs to talk at, Yaz provides the human touch, for half the effort. People just work differently like that, she knows.

It is much less work on Yaz’s part. And that suits her just fine – especially lately. She can scan their surroundings for blue boxes or blonde hair, and not miss too much.

And if she can look for these things and never get called out on it, then that is even better.

She remembers suddenly who Maisie was talking about. ‘Maybe he has a heart,’ she suggests, her head turning away as she turns the patrol car to the right. Out of the corner of her eye, she sees a resident spot the patrol car and visibly pale. She thinks nothing of it: law enforcement can make people uncomfortable, and she can understand why. Especially if they’re anything like Stevens.

She chastises herself. It is far too easy to join in the chorus of dissent against him. All he’s done around her is be a little grumpy, that’s all.

‘Pfft,’ Maisie responds. ‘Please. That man is one hundred percent robot and always has been.’ The long sip of her coffee is punctuated with a sudden, punchy slurping sound.

The word _ robophobic _ flashes to the front of her mind, in the voice of the Doctor. _ Some of my best friends are robots! _Yaz grimaces. The effects of time travel – it has changed her morals about things she’d never expected. The thought of the Doctor has her heart sinking, again; she pushes on. ‘Imagine if he heard you saying that.’

‘But he won’t. Come on, Yaz; when does he bother with people like us? Except you, if today’s anything to go by.’

Yaz shifts in her seat. Stevens had managed to catch her in the corridor just as they were about to leave, and personally congratulated Yaz for her part in pursuing and arresting Jamie Boyle. Maisie, being Maisie, stared at him the entire time, eyebrows raised, like she couldn’t quite believe there were positive words coming out of his mouth.

Neither of them were particularly surprised that, almost immediately after Yaz voiced her gratitude, he _ harrumphed _ and stalked off without another word.

Still, to get praise from Stevens of all people is unheard of. It makes Yaz uncomfortable, knowing what she does. There is, after all, a reason why Tang and Sunman questioned her afterwards.

And no doubt Sunder knew. But – she deliberates on this as she passes by Park Hill, with Meadowhall behind her and the city ahead – if he knew and Stevens didn’t, then that must mean it was withheld. Why? Why would they do that? She’d prefer at least _ one _party in the whole situation deal with the truth – because God knows she can’t.

She needs everything else in her life to work normally. She needs to have something to steady her, something to help her cope.

Otherwise the guilt will eat her alive.

Maisie doesn't comment on Yaz’s lack of answer. She takes it as an opportunity to divert the conversation about Stevens to the childhood friend she’d got off with last night, diving into an anecdote about sneaking around the guy’s utterly clueless parents. It’s like something out of an American movie; Maisie can hardly believe herself. Something still attentive in Yaz’s brain is still functioning, still paying attention; clocking the funniest parts and the open-ended questions.

With conversation returning to normal topics, Yaz returns to looking out, hopeful. In these built-up areas of Sheffield, there are more people to scrutinise. Dog walkers and pram pushers and rogue groups of teenagers. Grandparents out with their littlest ones, already looking harangued by the sheer bundles of energy their children have produced. Business women strutting in heels, looking stressed. Young couples, hands entwined and smiles eternal. Naive, maybe: waiting for life to happen to them.

Listen to her. She sounds old, wizened. Like she's forty, not twenty. She shakes her head and drives on, carefully cataloguing the behaviours of each person walking the streets of Sheffield.

All of them, capable of the most incredible things, she thinks. The individual as important as the masses.

‘...and I just thought, “Who in their right mind would try to resurrect old rivalries over a Year 9 romance?” And of course it’s this girl, Sasha, who keeps side-eyeing me the whole night. Especially when she sees me wrapped around Jacob’s arm. She goes batshit. I told you, alcohol does some incredible things to people.’ Maisie pauses. ‘She works for the Daily Mail now, I think.’

The radio bursts to life; Maisie jumps, the physical re-enactment of Yaz’s own surprise. From the crackle, they decode the message from Communications: reported break-in. No known suspect, and no injuries. Yaz and Maisie are to visit the victim’s house on Lucas Street to gather as many details as possible.

Lucas Street, right in the middle of Burngreave. As Yaz holds in a sigh and swings the car back around, Maisie reports back their confirmation.

‘Break-in,’ she repeats to herself. ‘Exciting, right?’

Yaz shrugs. ‘Wouldn’t know,’ she answers. She can’t remember the last time she did a door-to-door round for a break-in.

The loud noises next to her signal the finishing of the latte. ‘Course you wouldn’t,’ Maisie jokes. ‘You’re always needed for the tougher things.’ She flashes a grin, and Yaz smiles back.

At least the main roads are not too clogged up. It makes sense: lunchtime is over, and most traffic is from parents travelling, doing errands or fetching kids from playschool. The landscape changes, from urban to suburban; offices to two-storey homes. Yaz wonders what it’d be like to live in one of these houses: who her neighbours would be, to take for granted having stairs in one’s own home. She wonders how different she would be as a result of her different environment. And then, as these meandering trains of thoughts often do, she wonders if she ever would have met the Doctor.

She wonders if that, too, is a fixed point in time; if she was always meant to meet the Doctor.

She burns with grief, and frustration, and all the nothingness – but quietly, she hopes so.

The house in question is situated in a basin, a little way removed from the road itself. Yaz eases the police car into the drive adjacent to the road and silences the rumble of the engine with a gutting motion. It dies quickly.

She can feel Maisie’s eyes on her, and she doesn’t know why.

Yaz keeps that quietness all the way down the stairs to the front garden, overgrown and shadowed by a large evergreen. Her eyes are roaming around the area immediately, looking out for signs of disturbance: perhaps a glove left behind; a brick; any evidence. Immediately, Maisie spots the front window, smashed, through which the burglar must have entered.

‘Leading to the living room,’ Maisie notes aloud, scribbling everything down in her notepad already. When they peer through the window, they can see a room half-assembled: a sofa, a chair, but no coffee desk. Tellingly, the TV stand sits proudly, wires out, but no TV is displayed.

The living room window is adjacent to the front door, so with a nod, the girls decide to get the questioning over with. They know it’ll be largely useless – why would they have been put on it otherwise? – as incidents like this, without a suspect, rarely bring up anything helpful for them to deal with. But it looks like decisive action, at least, and a slight reassurance that the police are bothered about the people they choose to protect. That’s about as much as this poor victim can hope for, Yaz thinks. She knocks four times, each rap on the door clear and loud. She takes in the cracking white paint around the door, as Maisie stomps her feet to combat the cold. Having phoned only half an hour prior, the victim should be expecting someone soon.

Maisie smirks at the sound of something falling over. A vase, perhaps, or a bottle? They don’t know. They don't know the person inside yet; whether it's evidence or circumstance.

‘Be nice,’ Yaz warns her lightly, as the light flicks on in the hallway.

Maisie widens her eyes, feigning innocence, as they listen to the door unlock. In the door's patterned window, they see a blur of blonde, haloed in the warm orange light. Yaz's heart lurches.

But she can cope, she reminds herself. She is here to do her job. She is doing her job. Putting on her most genial smile, ready to greet the unknown citizen who _ needs her to do her job_.

The white door opens, a measured creak – and Yaz's heart promptly tumbles out of her chest.

Standing in the doorway, hands bundled in the deep green jumper that swamps her, is Jane.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> O SHIT WHADDUP JANE
> 
> edit: THE TRAILER IS SO AWESOME WHAT THE HELL
> 
> second edit: have corrected the timeline that got super messy in my head


	6. six: wishing you were here tonight is like holding on

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _and i still get to see your face, right?_
> 
> _and that's like nothing they can take, right?_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> super sorry this is late; this weekend is _super_ busy for me and i've not had a chance to sit down from like 8am.  
also, i've recently been struck down by writer's block, probably as a result of creative strain from uni work (with impending deadlines, so that's not at all stressful) as well as fanfiction, so i'm currently really struggling to get a single word out. thank god i finished this chapter before it completely went bust. chapter 7 should be fine for next saturday, but i can only apologise it isn't the two chapters as promised; i will make up that deficit sometime soon. in the meantime, i hope chapter 6 lives up to expectations
> 
> for this chapter, i'd recommend listening to ['an evening i will not forget'](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s0Z0S6V0VaQ) by one of my favourite artists, dermot kennedy

Jane is so much quieter than Yaz expected. She _ feels _quiet.

What she was expecting, exactly, Yaz doesn’t know. With the world so upside down like this, it is an effort to swim through her own feelings, the memories of her thoughts, and ask herself to present evidence. There was not enough time with the Doctor – never enough time – to ask about Jane, on top of all the million other questions she’d had.

The chief one, of course, being, _ When will you come back? _

The final goodbyes were said far too quickly, and they were thrown into life in Sheffield without a pause for breath. In the weeks since, she has thought of this meeting: in the stalling moments of the patrol; in between bites of her dinner at the kitchen table; on the edge of sleep. And more besides.

But each time, the question of Jane has brought up different answers. She couldn’t know what personality the TARDIS would give her. She couldn’t know whether Jane would be happy, angry; miles apart from the Doctor or far too close. In all her wondering, the face of her – the identity of her – was blurred. How can she talk to a blur?

Now, Yaz asks herself: which blur was she talking to?

She was still thinking of the Doctor. Of course she was. Someone like her, at least. But Jane is nothing like the Doctor.

The clothes are all wrong. Off. There is nothing of the Doctor’s complete disregard for fashion – the ever-changing nature of ‘style’ must be a moot point when the Doctor travels all over space and time, Yaz is starting to understand – or her delight in bright colours. The stripes and the culottes have disappeared, replaced by the oversized jumper, and black work trousers.

Her face is still the same soft face, lines of age and wondering eyes. The square of her jaw; the roundness of her nose. But the edges of her mouth turn down and stay that way. Jane’s polite smile is nothing like the Doctor’s, not nearly as large.

Her ears are adorned only with two earrings, one in each ear. Simple stones. No stars, no grasped hands. Yaz does not know if that is worse or better.

Still, there is something sharp in her eyes. Not the Doctor’s zany brilliance, but something closer to studiousness. If her quietness is the first thing Yaz notices, then her sharpness is the second: face to face with this imposter for the first time, she feels watched by this woman, questions forming in both their gazes and neither of them answering the other’s.

Yaz is professional – in Tan’s eyes,_ the best of them _ – but it is a mammoth task not to collapse with the weight of this in her heart.

Even above the sound of her pounding pulse, Yaz can hear Jane answer Maisie’s request for questions – a soft, sure, ‘Yeah, of course. It’s Jane, by the way.’ Her nose scrunches with displeasure. ‘Don’t really like being called Ms Smith, if that’s alright.’ With a hand just peeking out from her jumper, she welcomes them inside.

The sound of her voice feels so familiar. Yaz’s heart lurches again. It hits her how much she’d missed it. So much, so much. She could almost cry with it.

They file in, thanking Jane for holding open the door, and immediately begin looking around. Reminding herself of her job, her _ duty_, Yaz spots the usual paraphernalia of a corridor: a mirror on the wall; a set of keys thrown onto an old-fashioned set of drawers. On the drawers, also, blue and red flowers stand to attention, steadied by an ornate cream vase. Just a little ways away, a wet patch on the floor has soaked through the dull brown of the carpet where the vase must have fallen. Closer to the door, an autumn coat, grey and sleek, hangs on a wooden clothes rack, draped over a more padded olive green coat, complete with furred hood. On the shoe rack are a huddled collection of heels and trainers, none of them the trusty walking boots the Doctor lives in. The sight of plain black heels strewn on the floor near the door, only recently taken off, almost does not register at first.

Yaz and Maisie head into the living room, adjacent to the stairs and immediately to their right. Jane follows behind. The living room feels no less incomplete even with the three of them populating it. In close proximity, Yaz registers the open doors to the dining room up ahead, and the boxes of belongings pushed against the wall. A book tumbles out; the cover black and white, a sci-fi thriller. Has Jane even settled in yet? It’s been three weeks.

‘Nice place,’ Maisie comments. Yaz is not at all convinced by it. Any other day she would raise an eyebrow at her, set off a little smile from her friend. But today she can’t.

All she can do is watch, really, and try not to let everything get to her.

She can’t bring herself to start the questioning. She can’t bring herself to look at Jane, who keeps looking at her. She casts a glance to Maisie, who nods, and strides over to the window.

‘Can I get you two a cup of tea?’ Jane asks suddenly. ‘Sorry, I feel like I should’ve asked you that already.’

‘Thank you, ma’am, but we won’t take up much of your time,’ Maisie answers, adjusting her police jacket. ‘I’ve just had a latte anyway. Think I might explode if I have another hot drink.’ Jane laughs politely. ‘D’you mind if we have a chat about the window now? We can sit down on the sofa if you’d like.’ She beckons to the sofa in front of them – it is puffy and old, the dark brown leather starting to crack in some places. Yaz looks to Maisie, takes in the slight discomfort on her face, and represses her resultant smile.

Jane sits, hunched over and her hands bunched in her jumper. Her left leg starts jittering. Her smile is still polite – perfectly intact, actually. As if remembering herself, she sits up a little straighter, though the jittering still continues.

Maisie sits next to her, her pencil in hand, hovering over her notepad. Her quick smile at Jane is placating. ‘When did you find your house had been broken into?’ she asks.

‘Only at twelve, when I came back in my lunch hour,’ Jane responds. ‘Must have been like that before I left, but I don’t come in this room when I’m in a rush to get out the house, so I completely blanked it. I phoned as soon as I saw it, though. Didn’t think you two would be here ten minutes later.’ She frowns. ‘I’m gonna need to phone my boss about this, actually.’

‘We had the time,’ Maisie shrugs as she writes down Jane’s words. ‘So you’re in your lunch hour?’ Jane nods. ‘What do you do?’

The light streams in through the tree outside and glints off the shards of glass. So, too, does a draft stream in; Yaz stuff her hands into her pockets. From what Yaz can make out, it was definitely a heavy object that shattered the window – impressive, considering the strength of these windows. But – Yaz looks around the living room, cataloguing the same dull brown carpet, the cream, patterned wallpaper – if this is an old house, it might not be so fortified. The suspect must know something or other about burglary – or this house, at least.

To smash a front window, though? Brazen, at best. Yaz frowns.

‘I’m a temp. Just – I just do admin, HR, that sort of thing. Contracts for different companies. Pretty normal 9 to 5 stuff.’

‘And you came back…’

‘I left my purse here. Wasn’t really awake this morning.’ Jane looks away from Maisie in embarrassment and catches Yaz’s eye; her smile is rueful. ‘I’m _ definitely _not a morning person.’

Yaz chuckles at that. Jane’s smile turns from self-punishing to something a little sweeter.

Yaz looks away, to the floor. Swallows.

All she can think about is the Doctor. Heartbreak and hopelessness. She doesn’t think she’s needed her presence more than right now.

_ I’m so sorry. There’s no other way. _

Maisie finishes scribbling down her note, and punctuates it vigorously. ‘You were damn lucky they didn’t go for your purse as well, ma’am.’ Jane huffs her agreement. ‘And it wasn’t like this yesterday?’ 

‘No, no. I was here last night.’

‘With anyone else?’

‘Uh, no,’ Jane sighs. ‘No. Just me.’

Yaz straightens back up and pads around the rest of the living room. She cannot shake the feeling of incompletion; like this place was someone else’s before the TARDIS moved Jane here. She marvels at the TARDIS’ effectiveness; her influence over real-life events even down on Earth.

No wonder the Doctor loves her so much, Yaz thinks. 

Aside from the sofa and the boxes, the living room boasts a deep red rug, and a wooden end table up against the far wall, upon which a retro-looking vinyl player sits, plugged in but switched off. To the side of this stands a stack of records and CDs, and Yaz gives them a cursory glance: amongst other famous names are the musicians Bud Powell, Coltrane and Duke Ellington. On the top of the vinyl, opened and left alone for now, lies a record sleeve of Billie Holiday’s ‘Best Singles’. 

These are untouched, she thinks, at least by any burglar. In fact, everything else seems to be in place – nothing missing except the TV. Though the unsettled nature of the room, the house, made that hard to gauge at first, she is fairly certain that nothing else is amiss.

She stands straight at the conclusive thought, and moves to stand beside her colleague. The motion is interrupted: through the windows in the door, she can see the frankly antique dining table. On it stands an opened, empty wine bottle, and a single wine glass. An inch or so of white wine rests at the bottom.

‘Does anyone else live here?’ Yaz can tell that Maisie is already tired of going through the motions.

‘Nope. Just me. Just moved in,’ Jane answers, confirming Yaz’s hunch. ‘I inherited it from my gran. Only family left.’ She grimaces. ‘Hell of a parting gift, I s’pose.’

‘Ah,’ Maisie responds, nodding to herself. ‘When did you move?’

Jane’s face compresses slightly as she casts her mind back. ‘Two, three weeks ago? It all blurs into one, you know. Moving in.’

Maisie smiles as if she understands this phenomenon. ‘What time did you go to bed last night, ma’am?’

‘One a.m., I think. Around that time. Then I was up at half seven. Didn’t hear anyone in that time.’

‘So you were alone in the house all night.’

‘Yeah – or, I thought I was.’ Jane scoffs. ‘Imagine my surprise.’

‘Don’t have to imagine it,’ Maisie smirks. ‘Apparently you were a little put out on the phone to us earlier,’ she adds. Must have been her call back to Communications, Yaz thinks. She was barely listening, just concentrating on the car.

When she tries to imagine the call, all she hears is the Doctor’s voice – her way of speaking. So she tries not to; just stands patiently, taking everything in. Calming her heartbeat.

‘S’pose I was.’ Jane offers no apology. Neither of the police officers ask for one either: Maisie is busy completing her sentence, and Yaz is attempting stoicism while Jane offers her a polite smile.

‘And your burglar alarm didn’t go off? Breaking a window would surely be a big enough trigger, wouldn’t it?’

Jane closes her eyes briefly. ‘Bloody thing: I’ve been trying to get it replaced. My gran – she was old, she wasn’t handy or anything – and I was the only family she had. No one had a look, and from what I’ve seen it's been broken for a while. Between work and unpacking, the job fell to wayside a little.’ She chuckles, with no humour. ‘Knew there’d be a consequence.’

Maisie sits up suddenly and shuts her notebook; the individual papers slap against one another before the cover gives a slightly heavier _ thump_. ‘So: burglary could have happened between one a.m. and twelve p.m.. Mostly likely early hours of the morning, but we can’t know for sure. No witness, no suspect. Only the TV taken,’ she summarises to Yaz.

With a jolt, Yaz realises their time with Jane is quickly ending. And she hasn’t said anything but _ thanks._

She can’t guarantee that she’ll even see Jane again. Idiot, she chastises herself. She’s been given this perfect chance and what has she done? Avoided Jane like she’s the plague.

‘Thanks for your time, madam,’ she jumps in, just as Maisie opens her mouth to speak. When Jane looks at her, it is with a small smattering of surprise; one eyebrow raised. ‘We know it’s eating into your lunch break so we’re sorry about that.’

Jane waves it off. ‘Don’t worry about it, honestly. My boss will understand – or he better, anyway.’ She stands up to face Yaz properly. ‘I’m sure you two are busy as well, so I really appreciate it.’

Maisie and Yaz share a look – Maisie is unable to hold back a slight scoff. For image’s sake, Yaz says, ‘We’re probationary officers, madam, not yet graduated.’ It is partway to an explanation. Jane doesn’t need to know the rest of it. ‘You’re our first break-in, I think.’

Jane crooks an eyebrow. ‘I’m your first?’ she repeats, her smile on the way to languid.

Yaz can’t breathe. ‘I – I s’pose you are.’ The smile on her face is flimsy, and Jane knows it.

She must know what she’s saying, Yaz thinks. _ Surely. _

Jane confirms it not a moment later when she directs her attention to Maisie as well as Yaz, and her pose immediately changes. She crosses her arms, her smile tempered; much more exact than before. ‘I wouldn’t have thought it,’ she confesses. It is all innocence. ‘Thank you, honestly.’

‘It’s unlikely we’ll be able to find the perpetrator from your word alone,’ Maisie notifies Jane, ‘but we’ll have a go round the street to ask if anyone saw someone with a TV last night. That still might come up with nothing, ma’am.’ She is the final one to stand, moving to leave. Yaz follows, as does Jane; making their way to the corridor.

As Jane opens the door, Yaz continues, ‘In the meantime we’d suggest getting your window replaced; and fix those alarms. There’ll be local hardware companies to help, and if you’re lucky they might have enough sympathy to knock the price down a bit.’

Jane nods. ‘I’ll keep that in mind. Thank you, officers.’

‘Just be safe, and we’ll report back anything we can tell you,’ Maisie responds. ‘We may come to visit within the next few weeks, though we can’t guarantee anything will come from it.’ She pauses. ‘It was nice to meet you, ma’am.’ Then, she turns to Yaz, eyebrows raised, smile polite. ‘Ready to go, Khan?’ She already has one foot out the door.

‘Right behind you.’

Maisie nods and waves at Jane, walking not to the patrol car but to the side, where she can look at the window once more. As soon as she does, Jane turns her head back to Yaz, eyebrows raised expectantly. There it is again – that fluidity of posture, that strange mix of quietness and sharpness. Both her hands are clutched onto either side of the door, but she leans forward, closer to Yaz.

Yaz breathes in. Right. She has to nudge herself into Jane’s life somehow. They have to keep an eye on her. They have to look after her. She doesn’t know if she’s breaking the rules here but it is the only thing she can think to do.

Her notepad and pencil have been languishing in her police jacket for the duration of this visit, but she quickly grabs them and scribbles something down. She tears the piece off and hands it over to the curious woman in front of her. She dare not glance at her colleague, she dare not give the game away. She just keeps looking forward, seeing ghosts in the strange eyes so familiar.

‘I just wanted to say, madam – if you’ve got any questions or concerns, you can use this number to contact me. And hopefully, I can offer you some reassurance.’ She smiles as Jane takes the slip offered to her. For a split second, one of her fingers brushes against Yaz’s. Jane’s hand is so cold. ‘Sorry we can’t do more.’ She won’t look at Maisie. She won’t acknowledge this.

At first, Jane says nothing; she simply cocks her head to the side, an ever-so-slight motion, and watches Yaz. A second or two passes.

Maisie, Yaz thinks, is still inspecting the trodden grasses. Yaz hopes.

Eventually, Jane wonders, ‘Is this a personal phone number?’

‘Yeah,’ Yaz confesses. Prays it will work.

‘Dedicated to the job then.’ Jane quietly folds the piece of paper up, and, lifting her green jumper, slips the number into her trouser pocket. 

_ To you_, Yaz wants to say. The Doctor stands in front of her, gazing down at her with her slow wide grin; the earrings glinting, the shine in her eyes. Yaz aches. _ To you. _But she blinks and the Doctor is gone, and Jane is standing there, curious and quiet as ever: one eyebrow raised.

‘I s’pose I am.’

It makes Jane smile, that languid smile that sends a nervous jolt straight through the police officer. 

‘Khan!’ Maisie commands her. Movement distracts them both; Maisie is already making her way out of the grasses and back to the patrol car. Yaz has no choice but to follow.

Jane turns her head back to the officer still at her door, and Yaz has to force herself not to look at the curve of it; the orange light from the corridor and the grey of the day endeavouring to lighten her. And still, that smile. Yaz looks down, but her head snaps up to face Jane when the woman says, ‘It was great to meet you, Officer Khan.’

‘Yasmin,’ Yaz corrects. ‘Yaz to my friends.’

_ ‘Khan!’ _

Jane laughs at Maisie’s intervention, a single exhale of breath. ‘Great to meet you, Yasmin.’

Yes, yes it was. Despite the ache, the hurt and the grief. Despite everything.

* * *

_ Jane Smith (12:42): Yasmin? _

_ Yasmin Khan (12:45): Hi Jane! Did you have a question? _

_ Jane Smith (12:46): Yeah _

_ Jane Smith (12:47): Do you know any good window companies? I know absolutely fuck all about Sheffield _

* * *

Maisie is staring at her when she gets in the driver’s seat.

She looks fit to burst.

Yaz stares back at her. ‘What,’ she says, and it’s not even a question. She knows it is not a question, because of all things, the one thing Maisie is not – and has _ never _been – is subtle.

Not for the first time, Yaz wishes she was. Especially now.

‘I know you want to serve and protect but you don’t have to take it _ that _ far,’ her colleague grins. So it comes. Yaz lets her head fall onto the head rest, letting Maisie spill all the teasing she needs out of her. Maisie laughs. ‘Come on. “I’m your first”?’ That is flirting 101 there. Holy shit, Yaz, you got a cougar ready to _ pounce_. I’m genuinely impressed – and, I’m not gonna lie, a little offended.’ She shakes her head in wonder. ‘If you didn’t give her your phone number while I was sniffing around then I will be _ super _disappointed.’

And Yaz can’t exactly deny it, can she? Instead, Yaz starts the car and reverses it out of the drive. By now, Maisie should be radioing back, relaying details and confirming their return back to HQ. Instead, she’s delighting in the opportunity to tease Yaz to kingdom come.

But everything else is taking hold. All the emotions she had no time, no space, to process. The shock and the grief and the relief and the _ hope_, the sheer hope, in seeing Jane. That she is alive, still, after almost a month. That she is safe, burglar not counting, and that she is, at the very least, receptive to the idea of communicating with Yaz.

And if all goes well, then it means they will get the Doctor back. But Jane existing cannot confirm that; she can only confirm the Doctor has gone.

The Doctor has gone.

The relief spreads through her like fire, mottled with despair; poisoned by it. 

Yaz’s breathing has fallen out of rhythm. Burning and boiling. 

The Doctor has gone.

‘You gave her your phone number, didn’t you? You _ did!_’ Maisie laughs gleefully. She picks up the radio, her thumb hovering over the button. ‘Oh my God, this is huge. Flirting on the job. Legendary. Tomasz and Tan are gonna absolutely _ love_—’

‘Don’t tell them,’ Yaz snaps. She will not cry. She will _ cope. _

Maisie’s face immediately falls. ‘Wh – Yaz, come on, it’s a funny—’

She will not cry. She will not cry.

‘Please, Maisie.’ It is difficult to speak with her jaw so tight, keeping her shaking at bay – more difficult to speak calmly. With a look to her friend, she attempts damage control. ‘Not today.’

The silence between them is charged. Maisie’s confusion dampens the air like smog, infecting the both of them. But Yaz can’t speak. She can’t do it. She can’t implicate Maisie in her own danger. She keeps her ears trained on the growl of the patrol car as she guides them to the B-road. Back to HQ and enough distraction to let this topic go. She hopes the turning wheels of the car will ground the questions down to nothingness.

No such luck. If she were to look, she would see Maisie fixing her with a glare. Half out of confusion, half out of concern.

‘Hey.’ Yaz still won’t look. ‘Yaz. Tell me what’s wrong.’

* * *

_ Yaz Khan (12:53): I met Jane. _

_ Graham (12:55): Hi Yaz brilliant well done...Everything okay? _

_ Yaz Khan (12:56): Don’t know. I’d like to talk about it to you two if you’re free tonight? _

_ Graham (12:59): Of course, always free as far as you’re concerned Yaz…Just come round after your shift...Do you want any dinner...Might do fish and chips again _

_ Yaz Khan (13:03): Fish and chips sound great, I can get some on my way back from work? _

_ Graham (13:04): Cracking idea...See you then _

_ Yazzy (12:55): I met Jane. _

_ Ryan (12: 56): HOLY SHIT !!!! _

_ Yazzy (12:56): Yeah _

_ Ryan (12:56): what’s she like? ok no wait u can tell us later _

_ Ryan (12:57): i mean ur comin round later right _

_ Ryan (12:57): whens ur shift end _

_ Yazzy (12:59): 8, earliest. I’ve messaged Graham as well _

_ Ryan (13:01): cool cool ok yh ur comin round then. tell us everythin _

_ Ryan (13:06): how u feelin btw? bout seein her? _

_ Yazzy (13:10): I don’t know _

* * *

Yaz turns up on the doorstep to the boys’ house, fifty-five minutes after the official end of her shift and clutching a plastic bag smelling overpoweringly of haddock and oil. There is no need for her to text Ryan about her arrival; he saw her through the window and zipped straight to let her in.

When he opens the door, the first thing Ryan does is hug her.

She lets out a soft, ‘Oof—’ and nearly drops the bag on the floor out of surprise. Not that she should be surprised – Ryan walked into her, resembling a zombie with his arms reaching out like that, and she had plenty of time to anticipate it.

But, well, she’s been a little out of it today.

With the bag quickly heating up her leg, and the cold from the evening freezing the rest of her, she takes refuge in the equilibrating warmth of her friend. Everything is a little out of order, but at least she can rely on him. She even tries to joke, muffled as it is in the fabric of his woollen jumper.

‘You just want the fish and chips, don’t you?’

Ryan laughs. But he responds, ‘It ain’t all that,’ his voice loud and clear. The advantage of being much taller, she supposes.

She is reminded of earlier that day, of her conversation with Tan. The jokes and the smiles. She threw that away again after the visit to Jane: unable to push down that mix of emotion burning her lungs, her throat, her chest, she shut up instead. Couldn’t talk, couldn’t engage, besides one word answers and professional responses required of her.

She saw the careful look on his face, and the concern painted all over Maisie’s.

But she couldn’t tell them.

Ryan lets go and smiles at her. It is not the grin he usually sends her way; he, too, is careful, but for different reasons. He knows. He _ knows_. It is incredible how much of a difference it makes.

So Yaz smiles back. Tentatively, but it is enough.

Greedy hands paw at the plastic bag, so she relinquishes her hold on it and starts to take her off her outer layers. Instinctively, she places her coat, her scarf, her gloves, on the hanger. Second nature; a second home. Third, actually, counting the TARDIS. 

Ryan immediately takes a lungful of salt-and-vinegar scents, and his euphoria is contagious. ‘Ah, mate. Best smell in the world. Took your time, though.’

She feels offended by that. Yaz slips off her trainers by the heel, and delegates them to watch the door. ‘Easy for you to say; you didn’t have paperwork to finish.’ She shudders at the memory. Sometimes the worst nightmares are her most mundane ones; hours of dreams wasted on never-ending imaginary reports. ‘Plus it’s not like I have much experience with burglaries.’

‘Burglary?’ Ryan repeats. When Yaz straightens up, he leads her into the dining room, the sound of a kettle boiling already reaching their ears. Piled up on the floor – in front of Graham’s place on the sofa – is a tartan blanket of brown, cream and black. Ryan is unable to avoid it, but he catches himself before he falls face first over their dinner. It sends him careering into Yaz, who braces for the impact. She can hear his small huff as he rights himself, but he continues his stride towards the dinner table, otherwise unperturbed. ‘You got to go to a burglary?’

Even thinking about the afternoon brings forward a trepidation that she can’t stifle. ‘And guess who got burgled,’ she says.

Ryan sets the bag down, next to where plates have already been laid out. His mouth open just so, he barely moves. ‘No way.’

She immediately moves to help release the bag of its contents. Haddock, chips, curry sauce and mushy peas. All the best bits. ‘Yes way,’ she replies. ‘Jane.’ She plants the sauces on the table, right in the middle. ‘It’s been passed off to my superiors anyway. Me and Maisie were just the face of it.’

In the kitchen, over the bubbling of the kettle, she can hear Graham call out, ‘Evening, Yaz! D’you want a brew?’

‘Yes, please!’ she shouts back. ‘Yorkshire, please!’

Her phone vibrates. Container of chips in one hand, she digs it out of her pocket.

_ Jane Smith (20:58): You’re a star, Yaz, thank you again for all your help! Phoned them earlier and they’re coming round tomorrow to have a look. Hopefully I won’t have too many nights with a hole in my house haha _

Yaz is not sure how to respond. If she should. She frowns at the text until Ryan coughs. In the kitchen, the kettle turns itself off.

‘That her?’ he asks gently. He’s staring at her, his eyebrows knitted together.

He keeps looking at her like that, the way Maisie did. She can’t keep his gaze.

The Doctor’s face is in her head, everywhere she looks. Turning her head to the right, she can see the Doctor wield a piece of chair, the rainbow scarf wrapped around her neck.

The rainbow scarf had been donned for a particularly chilly New Years celebration – on a planet that averaged -200⁰C during its summer. They never touched down, but watched from above as horizontal fireworks melted twisting, tumultuous paths into the ice of the frozen land. 

Back in the TARDIS, Yaz had adjusted the scarf for her. Laughed at the Doctor’s pout. Bottom lip protruding, eyes round and shining with disguised mirth. She’d been halfway to asking her for a hug when the first firework exploded below them, illuminating the console room in a gorgeous green glow.

Then the nebula. Then the distress call. Then Sheffield, and the Dalek, and then the ill-fated expedition to somewhere much better. So they hoped.

If she concentrates hard enough, she can blur the sight of the bookshelf and the drawn curtains, and picture the TARDIS materialising. Out comes the Doctor, with a thousand apologies, and a warmth Yaz has missed like she’d never known longing before.

‘Yaz?’ Ryan prompts her.

But she’s dreaming of ghosts, ghosts that alight behind a strange woman’s eyes and the cool metal of alien technology. As she turns her head back to her best friend, she breathes in – breathes in the present, and all the worry of it.

What were they talking about? Jane. Jane, of course.

‘Recommended a window company for her,’ Yaz explains. ‘Had to ask Mum for one, but it seems to have done the job.’

She attempts to reply quickly, but it is much slower using only one thumb.

_ Yasmin Khan (21:00): No problem! Any way I can help, let me know _

Her phone vibrates as soon as she puts it back into her pocket, but it is not her priority.

Graham ambles into the room, cutlery in hand, wrapping his deep red cardigan a little tighter around his waist. Like grandfather, like grandson: the first thing he does upon seeing Yaz is hug her. This time, she has adjusted to the conventions of interaction, and one of her arms is wide open, encouraging him. She knows the hug is for reassurance more than anything – and relief, she supposes – but for Yaz, it is also an olive branch for her blunder earlier that day. _ Like he ain’t, for me? _It burns her still.

When he breaks away from the hug, his eyes are sparkling with that same kindness. He has dismissed it, of course he has.

‘You’re a darling for getting this, Yaz, thank you,’ he smiles. It directs her attention back to the food, and she sits down, eager to tuck in. Quietly, he returns to the kitchen to finish making the tea.

Ryan and Yaz spend this interlude in comfortable silence, assisting each other in delegating portions onto plates. During this time, Ryan swallows a frankly impressive number of chips. 

‘Oi, leave some for the rest of us!’

He just grins.

‘He’s like a rubbish bin,’ Graham jokes when he returns, two mugs in hand, and sets them down on the table. West Ham and flowers; just as before. Ryan must have declined. The steam curls up and away; if she put her nose close enough, the scent would travel to her, relax her, like incense. Graham collapses into the dining chair, rubbing a hand on his thigh, and picks up a polystyrene container. Still grinning up at Yaz, he pops off the lid and starts pouring. The mustardy-brown sauce drips over the steaming fish. ‘Just swallows any old food up.’

Yaz’s hand darts for the mushy peas first, before Ryan attempts to hog it all, and lets it run all over her chips. Tinged green, they soak in the moisture. ‘He’s a growing lad.’

‘Can you blame me when it’s this good?’

He does have a point. ‘Should I get fish and chips from this chippy more often then?’ she posits.

‘Absolutely,’ Graham and Ryan say in unison. Looking at his granddad, Ryan breathes a chuckle.

‘Would save us from Graham’s cooking anyway,’ he adds, and Yaz almost doesn’t hear Graham's indignant protests over the sound of their laughter.

For a few moments, all three are occupied, too busy tucking into their food to engage in conversation. It is the first moment Yaz does not think about Jane for the first time since meeting her, and after the fact, she is quietly relieved.

It hits her when the dread returns, of knowing she will have to relive it for the boys. It has always been part of the deal – no secrets when it comes to Jane; they’re there to muddle through this together – but there is a quiet feeling burning a hole in her head, unsettling her distractions.

She holds her last moments with the Doctor so tenderly. Duck eggs and dread. Jane is not the Doctor, but she is close. She doesn’t want to make the same heavy-hearted mistake.

For a moment, she doesn’t think of Jane, and it relieves her. And, Yaz thinks, it shouldn’t.

‘Maybe this could become a tradition,’ Ryan suggests through a mouthful of haddock. ‘Fish ‘n’ chips with Yaz, I mean.’ He shrugs. ‘Ain’t _ tea at Yaz’s_, I know, but it’s _ our _thing. The three of us.’

_ Tradition_. Yaz aches. Graham and Ryan, her best friends. They are so good it hurts.

‘I like the sound of that, son,’ Graham nods, and through the steam from her mug reaching to the heavens, Yaz beams at the both of them.

* * *

Oil and haddock permeate the air, the only trace of a meal well enjoyed. Full to the brim, they have moved into the living room, leaning back to rest their stomachs as the food makes its way down. Ryan and Yaz share the tartan blanket on the sofa, whilst Graham resides in his chair. The television flashes with light, too sharp and dynamic against the soft ambience of the lamps in the living room. _ Call the Midwife _is playing, muted, but largely ignored.

Sometimes Yaz will catch a glimpse, her eyes lured to the movement, and watch for the actor who looks astonishingly like Lin. But it is a passing curiosity.

Food heavy in their stomachs and the yellow light heartening, a soft touch on their cheeks. They should be curling up in their seats, settling in under the spreading evening. If she could, she would nestle under the blanket, cover her shoulders; her hands securing a ball of warmth.

Instead, Graham is talking about going bowling with some of his bus mates. He is looking forward to it. That comment fades from lips, too, and he takes to sipping his second cup of tea.

The name floats between them, invisible and inaudible – but present. Growing under their feet, blocking the TV, blocking out the light in the living room until they are plunged into shadow.

Until too much, too much. She is trying to cope.

Ryan locks his phone – the _ tsk _pulls Yaz’s head towards the action – and looks over at her. Carefully, he watches her face for her reaction. ‘So you met Jane, yeah?’

This brings Graham back to life. Immediately, he adjusts his position in his chair, sitting up instead of mostly diagonal. He leaves his tea on an end table. ‘Did you talk much? What was she like?’

Yaz frowns down at her lap, at her right hand lying on top of the other. Around this time she’d have her hair loose and falling down her sides, unless she was still on shift. But she hasn’t taken it out yet. Still, she almost thought she saw it free – for a second she almost did. She keeps doing this, imagining things that aren’t there. Not insanity, just wishful thinking.

It is always wishful thinking.

In the corner of her mind, the Doctor turns to look at her, all her edges sharpened in the lights and shadows of her spaceship. The warm light suited her – complemented her. Sometimes, Yaz thought her an apparition, an angel. 

Wishful thinking.

‘Different,’ Yaz responds, looking up at Graham. Leaning forward, he hangs on every word she says. ‘She’s different.’

Graham frowns and sits up straight. ‘Well, yeah, course she’s gonna be different. She ain’t the same person.’

‘Different how?’ Ryan encourages her.

On the TV, two friends are arguing.

Her brows are furrowed as she goes over the conversations. Her professional capacity limited her; so too did the overwhelming. She must have seemed so strange, so unapproachable. And still, Jane was willing to talk – to _ flirt _with her? Her hands twist. She can’t decide if she’d rather be holding the duck eggs or the Sheffield steel.

‘She’s quiet,’ she answers, her own voice lowered. ‘She doesn’t have the Doctor’s…’ 

‘Boundless energy? Chaotic attitude?’ Graham suggests. ‘Lunacy?’ It gets a chuckle out of his grandson.

‘Dynamism,’ she decides on eventually. She’s not even sure that word is enough – but it is the closest thing she can manage. ‘It’s like she’s keeping a lot back. But she’s still so sharp.’

‘So what personality are we working with, then? Is she easy to get along with?’ Graham continues.

Yaz shrugs down at her hands. They shift; one hand on top, then the other. ‘I don’t know yet. We weren’t at hers for very long.’

‘Yeah, but you still got to meet her,’ Ryan interjects. ‘Ain’t that enough?’

‘Not really. I – it’s not enough to get a real rapport with her. To her, I’m a very kind police officer.’ She switches her gaze between the both of them. Of the two, it is Ryan who leans forward now, phone ready in his hand. A notification brightens up his screen, and the blazing red of his lockscreen draws her eye to it automatically. She ignores it. ‘To me she’s just – a stranger. An acquaintance, maybe, if we’re desperate.’

‘We’re definitely desperate,’ Graham adds. 

‘Right, but I only know surface facts. She’s a temp, for which company I don’t know and right now I don’t think that’s important to us. She thinks she inherited the house from her “nan”. She’s on her own, with no parents or family, which makes sense. She’s either lazy or really distracted, ‘cause she hasn’t finished unpacking and to be truthful, it doesn’t seem like she had much in the first place. Most of the furniture’s her dead “nan’s”. And she likes wine.’ Yaz pauses. ‘A lot.’

Ryan and Graham are nodding along, taking it in.

‘And she flirted with me,’ Yaz drops.

‘You’re kidding,’ Graham says, mouth half-open.

Ryan’s eyebrows shoot up. ‘Wait, _ what_?’

She grimaces. ‘And I gave her my number. But that doesn’t mean we’ll know how she gets along with us, if she does at all.’

Graham starts muttering under his breath, turning to pick up his mug again. Only when he takes a sip from his cup does he stop his scandalised whispering.

‘Damn, Yaz,’ Ryan murmurs. ‘You weren’t even trying, either.’

‘No, I was trying to make sure she didn’t slip through our fingers,’ Yaz says. ‘I didn’t know what else to do.’ She groans. ‘I just need her to be my friend, is all.’

‘Well, that ain’t the signal you’re sending,’ Graham chortles. ‘What were you even doing to make her flirt with you?’

‘Well, it wasn’t me, Graham!’ Yaz protests. ‘I was there in a professional capacity.’

He blinks at her protestations, suitably chastised.

‘You _ did _give her your phone number,’ Ryan adds.

‘Yeah, because I _ want to keep her in our lives_,’ Yaz retorts, fixing him with a glare. ‘Neither of you would forgive me if I let her slip away like that. I wouldn’t forgive _ myself_.’ Her hands start fidgeting on their own accord. ‘Nothing else I could do.’

‘So she just liked the look of you,’ Ryan responds, waggling his eyebrows at her.

She tries to slap him, but he’s leaning away from her, and she away from him on the chair arm, so at best she manages a pathetic poke from her middle finger. ‘Ryan!’ she yowls. ‘Seriously, it’s not helpful.’

‘You’re telling me,’ Graham responds over Ryan’s laughter. ‘Not to be the buzzkill, but if she gets too invested then it’s gonna be harder for her to turn back into the Doctor. And if _ you _get too invested, Yaz—’

‘I won’t,’ she interrupts. They let her words shimmer in the silence for a few seconds. Opposite her, Graham keeps her gaze: concern deepening the lines on his face, his countenance calm despite the stakes. Yaz keeps her head high, puts on her bravest face. ‘I won’t,’ she repeats, a promise.

‘How d’you know?’ Ryan asks.

His expression is the same as his grandfather’s. Yaz can’t even be mad at him for that.

‘’Cause Jane's not the Doctor,’ she asserts – though, by God, Yaz wishes she was.

They let it hang in the air between them, her words determined for a third time. The telly plays on, trials and tribulations unimportant. All that exists is the feeling of her – the ghost that has joined the resident lingering. The Doctor is accountable for her own haunting – Yaz thinks she will be in whatever situation, for having such an influence on how they feel, a hold over all of them. _ And you gave us no choice about that_, she wants to say. _ You made us cope because we had to. This wasn’t us, not any of it. _

Yaz wants to pound at the Doctor’s chest, to shout it all at her. She wants to be enveloped by one of those scarce and sacred embraces. She wants to be near the Doctor again.

She wants to not fall apart at her face on someone else’s soul.

Maybe it is the edge in her voice, or the chill of ghosts drifting around the room. Either way, Graham’s face softens, and his eyes pick up the lamp light’s shine. Gone is the shock and the distance. Little space between them exists now, with no movement, and it calms her. Sense unbridled bringing them closer together.

‘So what do we do now?’ he asks her.

She stares at him, uncertain, but he nods at her to start.

Truthfully, there is little to be done. Time must march as it is wont to, here in the linear experience. No matter when the Limina make themselves known, Jane is a world apart from it all. They must keep it that way, lest they lose her.

Yaz would never forgive herself. So, she has to do something.

She takes the direction logically. Hard and cold thinking. Method leaves no stone unturned, no detail glossed over. Perhaps that way they can guarantee Jane’s friendliness over the next month or so. How best to ensure that is what plagues them.

Keeping watch is technically possible, but it requires an extortionate amount of time and resources – and a whole heap of luck on their side. Yaz takes them through the possibility: finding out Jane’s place of work, guessing her routine for it to be confirmed by actual reconnaissance; taking turns to journey, explore, and watch. “Accidental” meetings.

Slotting themselves into Jane’s life without her knowing of their watch would be difficult but not impossible. They’d have to be fortunate, and brilliant at lying.

Considering Yaz could barely talk like a human person around Jane, she doesn’t think that’ll go well, somehow.

Graham’s sudden reminder, five minutes into the planning – that, ‘Christ alive, we’re treating her like a bloody suspect!’ – highlights the absurdity of it all. It makes Yaz’s cheeks warm. Not that she was taking it seriously – she’s not a psychopath – but establishing a plan with so many unknowns is harder than it seems. Suddenly, the Doctor’s haphazard approach makes a lot more sense, even if it does still give her anxiety at the thought of their endless near-misses.

‘I just needed to think,’ Yaz explains.

Her phone vibrates. 

‘We don’t need to creep her out, though,’ Ryan interjects without looking up. He has already returned to texting on his phone. Cas, probably. She’d bet the sonic screwdriver on that.

Her phone vibrates again. Jane? Really?

‘God, no,’ Yaz frowns. ‘I’m not at all suggesting we stalk her—’

‘Are you sure?’ Graham interrupts.

‘—But I’m pointing out moments we can slot into her life,’ she continues. ‘If I have her number, I can become her friend. If we know about her, we can spend much more time with her, and know what’s happening around her when the Limina come. Then we —’ Yaz takes in a shaky breath ‘— we keep the Doctor safe.’ She turns to Ryan. ‘What was it you said?’

A third buzzing coming from her pocket. She won’t be surprised if it’s Maisie, what with her tendency to press ‘send’ instead of a comma or a full stop. It is not unlike Ryan’s texting style, come to think of it. It is somewhat alien to Yaz, though not always.

Emotion does that, she knows. Neon arrows point to the heart on Maisie’s sleeve, glaringly bright even through a white phone screen.

Ryan’s head comes up, then; his eyes a little glazed over. ‘When?’

‘Like, barely a minute ago, Ryan?’ She almost tuts. ‘When did texting Cas take priority over saving the Doctor?’

‘When you went all Detective Yaz,’ he fires back, but he locks his phone and leaves it to one side, sheepish. ‘Don’t creep her out?’

‘Before that.’

Ryan frowns at the blank space in his head. ‘Seeing at her a furniture shop, I think?’ But his pondering is interrupted by more buzzing emanating from Yaz’s phone, the vibrating sustained and persistent. ‘You gonna get that?’

Definitely not Jane, then. Unlikely to be Maisie. When she digs her phone out, her screen is dominated by the calling screen, and a single name displayed in large letters: _ Sonya Khan_.

Yaz freezes. Sonya hates calling.

It is most likely a butt dial – it’s happened before – but the hairs are standing up on the back of her neck, and everything in her is still. Call it gut instinct, or paranoia. But one flash of thought – of the crumpled skull, the solitary figure presiding over the body – seizes her.

The alarm bells cry.

She excuses herself quickly and retreats to the hallway, leaving behind her friends to wonder upon the urgency. Out of the corner of her eye, she sees Ryan gather up the rest of the blanket, a wordless question in his eyes.

She accepts the call immediately. ‘Sonya?’

For her sister’s sake, she keeps her voice even. Just like in training, she thinks. Calm and precise.

_ ‘Oh thank God, you actually picked up._’ Irritation permeates through the line, sharp and fast. No _ hello_, then. _ ‘I actually sent you a message, how’d you not see it?!’ _

Yaz rolls her eyes. ‘I’ve been busy, I’m sorry—’

_ ‘You said you’d finish work at 8,’ _ her sister immediately interrupts. _ ‘And you’re like, never busy unless you’re working so, like, what could you be – wait were you with Ryan? And that old man? Can you tell Ryan I say hi?’ _

Yaz immediately rests her forehead on the wall. ‘He’s still gay, Sonya,’ Yaz reminds her.

_ ‘Oh, yeah. Well, you never know.’_

‘No, Sonya, I really know.’ God, give her strength. ‘Why are you calling? Shouldn’t you be on your way back to Sheffield by now?’

_ ‘Am I not allowed to phone my big sister? Maybe I just missed you complaining and trying to mum me.’_

‘You’re not allowed to phone and not tell me why,’ Yaz answers firmly. ‘You’re stalling. Are you on the train?’

A pause. Unusual. Yaz immediately straightens up, tries not to think of hulking shadows looming over her younger sister. Sonya’s as travelled as many their age; she owes that largely to having a best friend all the way up in Newcastle. She revels in the freedom it brings, away from Mum’s fretting. Yaz’s own concerns preys on fears of the hulking shadows, drunk men taking advantage of Sonya’s youth. Nowadays, she worries with no small sense of hypocrisy.

At least Mum and Dad know the journeys Sonya takes. Yaz lives entire adventures in the unconsidered moments. She functions through distance, walls and barriers.

It is much better that way.

_ ‘I’m...on _ a _ train.’ _

Yaz sighs. ‘Are you on the _ right _train?’

_ ‘Obvs, I mean I’m not stupid.’ _

It is only now that she notices the urgency behind her reticence. ‘Sonya,’ Yaz encourages gently.

_ ‘I fell asleep, okay?’ _ It bursts out of Sonya, a firework of shame. _ ‘I don’t even know how but I bloody fell asleep and now I’m in – I don’t even know – like, bloody Chesterfield or somewhere—’ _

‘Language, Sonya,’ Yaz scolds her.

_ ‘Oh shut up, Yaz, properly, I’m on the wrong train and you’re having a melt over my language? Mum must be going _ mental_—’_

Of that, Yaz is absolutely certain. Two of those three messages must be from her, she guesses. She is the one who is meant to pick Sonya up, after all. Why hasn’t she told her?

Yaz knows the answer to that. Too little, too late, and a lot of embarrassment to boot.

‘Where’s your train going to?’

_ ‘Derby, then Birmingham, I think,’ _ Sonya answers. There is a pause as she checks on the screen in the coach. Quietly, almost as if an afterthought, the sound of the journey leaks through the speaker; the throttling speed of the train jostling the train coach and all its contents. _ ‘Yeah, Birmingham New Street. But it’s really late, Yaz, and, like, I can’t be arsed to sleep overnight on the bloody train. Mess up my sleep routine for _ weeks._’_The shake of her voice seeps through, even when the line weakens.

Yaz can’t even begin to consider Sonya travelling overnight. She unfolds her arms, her free hand wrapped around her stomach. A hollow reassurance. 

‘Why haven’t you phoned Aunty Laila yet?’ she frowns. ‘If you let her know she'll pick you up at the station. And you know she’ll drive you back from the station – or let you sleep over.’

_ ‘I don’t have her phone number – she got a new one, remember? But you have it.’ _

Yaz frowns. ‘You could ask Mum—’

_ ‘You’ve gotta be joking; she’d have a melt!’ _

Of course she would, Yaz thinks; you’re her daughter. You’re still her responsibility. And mine, too, the police officer sister.

She is usually the first point of call, even before Sonya herself. Aggravating though it can be, it is better than being kept in the dark. Especially in these uncertain times.

Her stomach twists at the images she attempts to banish.

It is not difficult to formulate a plan; to keep her sister safe. Having a friendly face in most major cities also helps; the happy consequence of a family that refuses to be left out of the loop. When Yaz phones their aunt to explain the situation, Laila is more than accommodating, despite the sudden turn of events. She accepts no promises of favours returned. They are family; that is all.

Sonya is significantly calmer when Yaz reports the good news. Yaz is no fool to turn down any favours returned from Sonya in the future, whatever they may be. They do not happen enough.

Calm, too, is their mum. She was three seconds away from phoning the police to report a missing person, considering getting through to her own way into the force – ‘That’s really not how it works, Mum’ – didn’t work. 

The parents can sleep easier tonight.

So, too, should Yaz. But paranoia is efficient; a slower worker than a virus or disease, yet just as harmful. At home, Sonya’s absence feels more like a presence. The silence is marked with their conversation, the fear buried deep underneath her sister’s shame. So many possibilities, so many of them terrible.

* * *

_ Laila Bhat (23:58): Sonya safe and sound back at mine! X _

_ Yaz Khan (23:59): Thank you bhua! You’re an absolute lifesaver xx _

* * *

In her sleep, it is Sonya who crumples underneath the monstrous power, and Yaz screams for her.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> also, _two_ trailers that look absolutely bomb and a ton of interviews. we gettin fed lads
> 
> edit: have corrected the timeline that got super messy in my head


	7. seven: are we holding on?

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _i'll stay open armed_  
_pain in all your scars_  
_are we in all your scars?_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> many profuse apologies for this being so, so late, but once again i've been battling writer's block _plus_ all the business that comes with the end of uni term. i've not had a chance to post this chapter until now, and i won't get the chance to post this at a more normal (uk) time, as i'm busy again tomorrow. the notifications will come through at 2pm on monday, but as you can see, this will have been up for fourteen hours or so before then.
> 
> as i'll be home from tuesday onwards, i will be left alone and allowed to write much more, so chapter eight should be on time. again, apologies!
> 
> for this chapter, i'd recommend listening to the gorgeous ['epoch'](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oEplzIlBDCc) by oliver spalding.
> 
> also, i have a faceclaim for my baby boy cas, so please head over to his [character page](https://strange-seas-fanfic.tumblr.com/cassius) on the fic blog!

_ Maisie Williamson (07:59): guess who i’ve got patrol with _

_ Yaz (08:01): No idea, Maisie, actually could be anyone _

_ Maisie Williamson (08:01): spoil sport _

_ Maisie Williamson (08:02): i’ve got tomasz _

_ Maisie Williamson (08:02): JUST tomasz _

_ Maisie Williamson (08:03): i can’t go on _

_ Maisie Williamson (08:04): keep me in your memories _

_ Yaz (08:06): You’re so dramatic, oh my God _

_ Maisie Williamson (08:07): he’s already going off about peaky blinders i’m gonna blind HIM in a min _

_ Yaz (08:07): YOU watch Peaky Blinders _

_ Maisie Williamson (08:10): yeah but i don’t wank over it like he does _

_ Yaz (08:10): Maisie! Ew! _

_ Maisie Williamson (08:10): lmao i bet he does tho! _

_ Yaz (08:15): I can’t believe you woke me up to complain about Tomasz _

_ Yaz (08:16): I really dislike you _

_ Maisie Williamson (08:17): no you don’t _

_ Yaz (08:18): Yeah I do _

_ Yaz (08:18): Have you told him about your high school reunion yet? _

_ Maisie Williamson (08:23): not really _

_ Yaz (08:35) Why _

_ Maisie Williamson (08:36): dunno if he’d find it funny _

_ Yaz (08:39): Whynot _

_ Maisie Williamson (08:39): i just know ok _

_ Maisie Williamson (08:39): maybe i should just to get him to shut up _

_ Maisie Williamson (08:44): yaz _

_ Maisie Williamson (08:50): YAZ _

_ Maisie Williamson (08:54): yAsmIn kHaN _

_ Maisie Williamson (09:01): did you fall asleep _

_ Maisie Williamson (09:13): yep you fell asleep. alright then god i can’t believe you chose sleep over me_

* * *

In a quiet moment, Yaz returns to the church yard.

She immediately has to bury her face in her scarf, a protection against the chill refusing to leave the world. Her journey is conducted as such: her head down, hands in her pockets, eyes trained on the ground; on her legs getting used to the motion.

Up, down. Her feet start heavy, but rhythm flows soon enough and her stride quickens.

It is March now – must the world forget that? Patience is a virtue, she knows, and she will wait. But patience is not mutually exclusive from complaining.

She walks to banish the plunging temperatures take hold of her insides. She walks, also, to banish the dwelling. It is Graham’s idea she has stolen, incorporating routine while the rest of her life adjusts to their special circumstances. There is truth to what he says: walking is enough to distract; that letting the air flow through her lungs, even as her nose turns cold in the exposure, sharpens the sense of feeling alive. And that becomes enough, for a while.

When she strides into her first puddle, it is not with the intention of doing so. The water soaks through her trainers, and her next steps are accompanied by an unpleasant wetness. She dodges the next puddle, and the next. Her heavy legs are light with the knowledge of them being there, instead the puddle helps her to think of the rainwater, the nature and herself in it. The puddles are intrinsic to the path she treads. It is easier being alive through it.

She does not need to think. Not of Graham, nor her sister, safe and sound and returned to Sheffield, but a consideration nonetheless. Nor does she need to think of Jane, the constant worry.

From it, she feels sharpened.

She notices the oncoming nature just because she can. Suburbia has sprouted beige and brown and red, all might and climbing heights. The city looms over her in her mind’s eye, obscured by Park Hill’s housing complexes – but she banishes its thought for the smaller details. The trees gripping onto the earth, where all life around them depends on them. The few scurries of small animals – either a rat or a cat, she doesn’t know – hidden in the bushes lining path and pavement. The blood red of holly bush and the richness of evergreen. High and above, out of the way, the wildlife of the sky display their great skills, diving and soaring in perfect synchronicity. 

People can do all they like to put a firm foot on the earth, but houses can fall and concrete ripped away. Weeds will burst through, tree root veins bulging on the pathways. At the end of the day, it is always nature that stays. It is always nature.

She need not think about anything else but nature.

Even when she joins the road, morning cars come to pollute, she does not pay it much attention at all.

She pauses at the foot of the church’s land. There is no fear, no hesitance, about herself, only the acknowledgement of a sense of holiness. It nestles within her upon sight of the church building. The recognition of a person’s place of worship is enough for it to unearth, for it to be cradled tightly within her. The unsecret sacred, inviting her to acknowledge their mutuality, their unity, even if not their own perfect synchronicity. She is not a bird; and they are not the same flock. But what, exactly, does that matter?

The thought of their unity is enough.

She traces the footprints of her past self, and beside her linger a companion set, with longer gaps between each print. As she walks alone, they are found only in the past. The memory of Graham and their conversation passes, curling away to join the air, sucked up inside the cars behind her and inhaled with the drivers’ own preoccupations.

Around her, the wind picks up, the sound of whistling in her ears like a ghostly inhalation. The trees of the church park are stricken by it, and branches sway helplessly. Their grip in the ground is as iron-tight as ever. By default, Yaz ambles over to it and simply gazes. Up ahead, elevated, is a winding road lined with houses, tread once before with Graham, that will take her back home. But above that is the bright of the sky; the milling clouds now charging at full pelt, buoyed by the sudden wind.

That is what she focuses on. The shaded greys, with blue bleeding through, and the sentries that stand watch over holy ground.

From near Yaz’s feet hops forward a curious visitor. Coarse brown feathers and a cream white belly: a blackbird, Yaz notes, a female one. At first, the bird points her dulled beak in Yaz’s direction – then pauses in her journey to look over at Yaz from the side of her face. Her eyes, the wide brown circled by a ring of gold, fixate on the human in front of her. She considers Yaz’s threat; her purpose. Her tail feathers protrude upwards, almost like a peacock’s.

Yaz stills completely, but her smile spreads. Out of the corner of her eye, she watches the bird’s head dart quickly from side to side, the seeming erraticism of the movement belying a careful weighing up of options. She could fly, easily, to the tree, but the human is rather prominent there.

A sudden vibration fills the air. It comes from Yaz’s pocket. Not half a second later, the blackbird flies into the tangle of branches on the tree, perched high and away. Presiding over the church park, she keeps a single beady eye on the human down below, and trills a warning.

The frustration rumbles through her and she releases it as a sigh. She checks the notification anyway: the tremble of Sonya’s voice resurfaces and makes her shudder.

_ Ryan (10:13): jus wanted to send you the link to some forum graham got from his friend _

_ Yazzy (10:14): Nutty Terry? _

She glances back up, and the darkening clouds are warning her. She wanted to walk around the park on the way back – Skye Edge, the one she and Graham walked parallel to the last time they were here – but one look at the changing sky dissuades her.

She leaves the blackbird to her daily duties, heaving her legs up the incline.

_ Ryan (10:15): yeh _

_ Ryan (10:15): it’s like not one of the racist ones thank god _

_ Ryan (10:16): even nutty terry knows a dog whistle when he sees one _

_ Ryan (10:16): think it’s decent just about like alien sightings in the local area _

_ Ryan (10:17): thetruthisinyorkshireforum.org _

_ Ryan (10:18): i dont take it too seriously but it’s up to date at least _

_ Yazzy (10:18): Thanks Ryan! _

The road guiding her, she comes to a natural stop at the opening to Skye Edge. It is overwhelming, the urge to buckle underneath its beckoning and lose herself in the surrounding of it: the dead husks of blackberries on thin bushes and the dusty trail of the path cut into the resilient grass. She breathes in deep, lets her mind wander onto the fields by itself. She imagines the trees and the feel of the bark underneath her skin. 

She’s been plenty of times, on trips with her family and with the few friends she could hold onto. To go back would be an indulgence, a temptation. A welcome trip down memory lane.

She feels pulled to it.

Not needing to think was a nearly ecstatic endeavour. And it’s been a while. But she has to commit to her present.

* * *

_ Yasmin Khan (10:35): You’ve got your window guy coming today right? _

_ Jane Smith (10:35): Yeah he’s on his way I think _

_ Yasmin Khan (10:36): Well then good luck! Hope it goes well _

_ Jane Smith (10:37): Thanks so much! You’ll have to come over to celebrate it afterwards haha _

_ Yasmin Khan (10:57): Yeah, definitely!_

* * *

_ Jane Smith (13:54): Also just wanted to say thanks for the chat last night, you’re a lot of fun. Quite glad you gave me your number actually _

_ Yasmin Khan (13:55): Me too :) _

_ Yasmin Khan (13:56): Can’t believe your boss tried to fire you for calling the police on your burglar _

_ Jane Smith (13:57): Right?? Honestly she’s a right twat_

* * *

‘Are you seriously saying you never saw _ Mean Girls _before I made you do it?’ Sonya asks. She laughs at the thought, the age-old tease rearing its head yet again.

Yaz rolls her eyes. ‘I had other things to be doing!’

‘What, like hanging around police stations?’

‘No, like doing my bloody schoolwork!’ she shouts from the kitchen.

‘You swore!’ Sonya yells gleefully, and Yaz is suddenly filled with the urge to shove her.

She should’ve expected it tonight, of all nights. She’s surprised Sonya managed to last ten minutes in the same room as her sister without reverting back to her favourite topic.

Drink bottles in hand – Diet Coke for Sonya, Fanta for herself – she returns to the sofa to see Sonya taking a Snapchat of the TV, the title menu for the film otherwise ignored. Her throw of the drink to her little sister is easily caught, though not without a sound of disdain.

‘D’you mind, I was busy!’ Sonya gasps, glaring daggers when Yaz laughs. But her glare isn’t half as serious as usual.

Curling up on her side of the sofa, Yaz tugs on the blanket; Sonya relinquishes her ever-so-tight grip on the material and graciously allows her sister to have some. It makes a difference. With the sun set and the lights dimmed in the front room, Yaz feels herself giving in to the need to hibernate. Sonya is too close and wouldn’t appreciate Yaz’s limbs being all over the place if she were to stretch out, but the sofa is already doing wonders for her back. Lots of standing up and shouting at people who can’t be bothered to park respectfully has made Yaz pretty exhausted.

God, she really does sound forty.

As it happens, when Sonya presses play – on the remote she made Yaz try to find for a solid three minutes – and the film starts, she stretches her legs over her older sister’s lap and pretends not to see when Yaz looks over questioningly. It is with a very loud, very exaggerated sigh that Yaz makes her resignation known.

She won’t push her luck, not tonight.

Sonya looks over to her and grins.

The film is something they chose on Netflix, neither of them overly engrossed in the plot – something about a mix-up with a wanted gangster? Yaz is not entirely sure. Every now and then, a pause in the music or the raised voices will cause them to sit up and pay attention, but over the flowing Punjabi, their concern alights on themselves; each other.

Five minutes in, Sonya diverts the conversation topic to her in-depth critique of all the main characters, scoffing at the music choices from the get-go. It is pretty impressive that she has managed to digest all of this while talking to Yaz, now she thinks of it. Maybe multi-tasking is Sonya’s hidden talent; what with all the time she spends on her phone, Yaz thinks it make sense.

_ She _ finds most of the film pretty harmless, but she leans back and listens to her little sister’s opinions, measuring the conviction behind the statement by how upright Sonya currently is. Swaddled in her thick new pyjamas, _ and _her fluffiest dressing gown, it is a sheer miracle Sonya hasn’t inflicted heat stroke upon herself – especially with the movement her critiquing requires.

Being the good sister that she is, Yaz nods along at all the right moments, gently cutting in when Sonya starts careering off on a tangent. It is the most engaged Sonya has been with her for – Yaz can barely wrap her head around it – for a good while, disregarding even the adventures Yaz has been on. No doubt it will not feel as long for Sonya, and maybe that’s a good thing: it makes the necessary reminder for Sonya even more poignant for her.

She dreads to think what would happen if they could never reach that gap again. She thinks of Maisie, Tan and Tomasz, and brings her legs closer to her body.

The ranting appears to ebb. They make it through an entire minute of the movie: Shinda attempts a daring escape, and the strings get higher, sharper.

Almost masked by the sound pulsing off the speakers, Sonya clears her throat. ‘Yaz.’

It takes her a moment to process her name being spoken. When Yaz turns her head to Sonya, startled, she sees Sonya looking at her timidly, scratching the back of her neck.

‘Thank you,’ she says, ‘for calling Laila. And – defending me, when I got back.’

She’d surprised herself too. Ready to let Sonya know of the dangers of travelling, instead she’d taken Sonya’s side when Mum was berating her, out of residual fear and guilt. Later reflection, however, told her it was less of a surprise. Moments of gratitude are few and far between in the day-to-day of things.

Life with the Doctor puts things into perspective.

Her little sister. Peach dresses at a wedding, the sisterly teasing she can never escape. Memories graced by only the two of them. Yaz swallows the lump in her throat; she’s too much to lose.

‘Always,’ Yaz promises. She puts a hand on Sonya’s outstretched leg, covered by the duvet as it is, and squeezes gently. ‘You’re my sister.’

Sonya nods, a hesitance eventually taken over by confidence. Her eyes reflect the TV light more than usual, though.

Yaz takes a gamble. She stretches out her arms, eyebrows raised. ‘I won’t bite,’ she promises.

Sonya scoffs and rolls her eyes, but shuffles along the sofa to come in for the hug anyway.

* * *

_ Yasmin Khan (23:11): Sorry for not replying earlier, was catching up with my sister _

_ Yasmin Khan (23:12): It doesn’t happen often _

_ Jane Smith (23:15): No don’t worry, I get that. Imagine it’s hard _

_ Jane Smith (23:16): Was very engrossed in GoT anyway so I’ll forgive you _

_ Yasmin Khan (23:23): Days like this make it easier. Game of Thrones? Which season you on?_

* * *

‘You’re bonding over _ Game of Thrones_?’ Ryan laughs. ‘Course you are.’ He grins. ‘That’s, like, the least Doctor thing she could do.’

‘Which is good,’ she says, nodding to herself. ‘It’s good.’ Out of the corner of her eye, she can see Ryan blinking at her.

‘Obviously,’ he frowns. A big _ clang _from the street behind them makes him jump. He glances quickly at Yaz, wondering whether she saw, but to him it seems as if she is not paying attention. He settles, crossing his arms.

Yaz has never been to Ryan’s garage before – not with any intention, anyway. She has often passed it on patrols, however. She’s a little relieved she does not have to attempt to justify a journey off the beaten track simply to see her friend: her police car is parked on the road, suspicious only through its bright colours. Even though her trip here is simply a quick social call, she would understand if others thought it invasive.

Situated just behind the rail tracks, the garage is right at home in its heavily urban surroundings. There is plenty of grey around them – the road, the buildings – to blend in with the overcast day. Brick and metal dominate the landscape: the warehouse facing off the garage is ringed by a tall, thick metal fence. Even the student accommodation next to the garage blends in seamlessly with the industrial atmosphere, so much so that at first glance Yaz had had to do a double take. Sign of the times, Yaz thinks to herself.

The garage itself is a conversion from an old building, an Edwardian build at least. In the red brick building where cars have been shuttered inside, an old-fashioned circular window looks down onto the street. Ventilators line the wall behind them, the aged grey turning slightly yellow and black. The fans drone quietly in the background noise. Opposite, in the garage building where the work commences, two vans and an old, burgundy Mitsubishi are parked, waiting for their turn to be examined, diagnosed and worked on.

Even this close to the centre, in the air there persists a sense of slowness. Perhaps that is the problem of a lingering winter, or the consequence of workers aiming to get on with the day.

Yaz wonders whether the languid atmosphere gets to Ryan, sometimes; whether his muscles work slower, his brain covered in a fug of stillness. Whether he wonders if it is worth it, sometimes.

She shakes her head. No point superimposing her despair on someone else. She knows it’s not the case, anyway; he’s told her many times that he prefers the garage to the classroom. It’s a sentiment she can easily translate to her own situation.

‘Can you imagine the Doctor watching it? _ Game of Thrones_, I mean.’ Ryan punctuates the silence with his meandering thoughts. ‘Bet she’d love season seven.’

Yaz turns to him. ‘Why?’

Ryan chuckles. ‘It’s Ed Sheeran, ain’t it?’

Yaz laughs with him. ‘Forgot about that,’ she announces, though she didn’t. Of course she didn’t.

The Doctor was home with her, and for a few moments, all had been right. Even if the Doctor had been talking about purple sofas or whatever – she had her family, and her Doctor. How could she forget that?

_ Her _ Doctor? No. No. She’s not doing that. _ The _ Doctor. She meant _ the _Doctor.

She banishes the thought, banishes the frenzy. ‘Jane’s on Season 5,’ Yaz says. ‘She’s trying to get it all watched before the new season. Bit easier when you’ve got free evenings, she says.’ Her pace picks up. ‘I can’t even remember most of season five, can you? Only watched it once and now, to top it all off, we’ve had all these adventures since then. And I bet they’d be perfect for a TV drama, too. It’s a minefield just trying to not spoil anything for Jane. Though I don’t think she’d mind too much.’ She frowns. ‘Hopefully.’

‘Is it weird that I thought she’d be doing… more?’ Ryan asks. ‘More than just binge-watching, maybe.’ He tightens his folded arms, squinting at the sky. ‘Always thought she’d be more like the Doctor.’

‘She’s nothing like the Doctor,’ Yaz reminds him. ‘She’s her own person. She’s normal.’

‘Yeah, yeah. I get that. Just.’ He scratches his temple. ‘Still proper weird, to be honest. Getting my head around it, and all. I know she ain’t the Doctor, but… just didn’t expect her to be so different.’

Quietly, Yaz confesses, ‘Neither did I.’

Not for the first time in this chat, Ryan gazes at her softly, openly. ‘I’m tryna figure out if it’s easier that way. But I really dunno. Hard enough knowing it worked, I s’pose. Must be even worse getting reminded of that every day.’ 

She remembers seeing Jane for the first time, the tumble of emotions that threatened to overflow. Seeing a stranger’s soul on the face of someone so dear. It _ is _something like grief, she knows, only with the permanent reminder. Face to face, and in her phone.

Echoes falling away.

She inhales, and stamps her feet in order to shake the cold away.

Ryan gets the hint. ‘Did I tell you about Nugget?’

Yaz raises an eyebrow at his complete change in tone; he leans onto the wall, his smile immediate. ‘I guess this is about The Dog?’

She is surprised that Ryan didn’t immediately text her, about this new update in their efforts to adopt The Dog. God knows he has been bombarding her with everything else – from Cas, to his newest “Let’s Play” upload, to Graham’s latest attempt to cook. Even his troubles with his warehouse mate Kya have been passed onto her, though that at least can be explained through their mutual frustration at trying to fit into a linear world. She gets him, this weird side-effect of time travel; hopefully, she can provide an ear when he needs it.

Ryan’s complaints about Kya’s sudden frostiness makes her grateful of her rapport with her colleagues, even if she feels estranged from them sometimes. At least they are not taking it personally, like Kya appears to be. 

“Nugget” must be a very, very recent development, then.

Ryan launches into a minute-by-minute retelling of his and Graham’s trip yesterday to a new adoption shelter. Each description of every new dog tugs at Yaz’s heartstrings, as it must have for grandson and grandfather to have met them face-to-face – but Ryan’s smile widens impossibly further when he finally arrives at the point at which he met Nugget.

‘It was instant, mate, it was immediate,’ Ryan describes. ‘She’s this _ tiny _ little thing, right, real runt of the litter, big beady eyes on her tiny head, and, oh, my God, Yaz, she just ran right up to me and tried to get through the gate to say hello. Kept tryna lick my _ entire _hand and she was yapping like anything, going wild. Graham says she’s a little bonkers but I love that, I love her. She’s our dog, y’know? She’s ours.’

‘So you’ve adopted her?’

‘No, I mean, Graham still needs to do all that,’ Ryan explains, ‘but he’ll be doing that soon and she’ll be at home by the end of next week, definitely. No one else’s gone for her, so we’re saving her, I think. And! And she’s still a bulldog, right, but I think she’s got a longer nose than them rest, so the man at the shelter said she’s got a little less chance of bracchy… brach—’

‘Breathing problems,’ Yaz cuts in.

‘Yeah.’ Ryan nods eagerly. ‘So that’s good for her as well.’

He is barely able to keep himself still – his hands keep jittering about, as if they are searching for a pup-sized shape to hold. In this moment, they could be anywhere, but all that matters to them is the thought of this little bulldog, ready to begin her new life.

‘And she’s not called Bessie,’ Yaz adds.

‘Thank God,’ Ryan exhales, slapping his hands together in mock-prayer. ‘Bet the Doctor will love her, you know. She’s too cute not to have in the TARDIS.’ He cocks his head back to Yaz. ‘D’you think she’s ever had a pet on her ship before?’

Before Yaz can fathom how to answer that, there is a movement that catches her attention. On the opposite side of the road, a guy their age saunters out from the open garage doors. Wearing a white tracksuit and less-than-flashy trainers – not too unlike Ryan’s deep blue ensemble, Yaz suddenly feels cramped in her bulky police jacket – he looks every bit the worker, preoccupied by the day’s events. It only occurs to her when he starts crossing the road that he is heading towards the two of them.

Then she recognises his face. She can barely believe it.

‘Oh,’ she murmurs. She finally gets to meet Eman – _ Cassius _ – for the first time in a decade.

Primary school was full of new experiences and fairweather friends. Cas was probably an acquaintance, at best; they must have shared PE lessons once or twice. She spent more time with Ryan than with Cas, and it is not as if she spent much time with Ryan either.

Like her, Cas was one of the quieter ones, preferring to watch and listen when everyone else was clamouring for the teacher’s attention. But he was good at football, and busy playing with the boys. Yaz was busy trying to impress the girls. That was how it was.

This grown-up Cas seems like an entirely different person; she almost doesn’t recognise the quiet boy of ten beneath the maturity of his face. Age has thinned the sides of his face and defined his cheekbones; his jawline is razor-sharp and his chin perfectly square. But his hair is still trimmed, the short back and sides not changed since their school days, and his studious gaze is the same as ever.

The years have been kind to him. _ Very _kind to him. As he half-jogs across the road to them, his arms come up to his side. The tracksuit sleeves are bunched up above his elbow, and Yaz spots defined muscles. She has to look away. 

Ryan immediately springs up from the wall and straightens his posture. He digs one of his hands into his pocket, whilst the other lifts to scratch bashfully at the side of his head. Though his smile is different, it is no less wondrous. He has turned to face Cas fully.

Fine then, Yaz thinks. She smirks to herself, knowing exactly where she stands in Ryan’s order of priorities.

‘Everything alright?’ Ryan asks, when Cas stops by his side.

‘Yeah, yeah,’ Cas responds, a smooth baritone of a voice. Hands on his waist, he casts a curious glance over to Yaz. ‘Why you talking to police, Ry?’

From this close up, she can see a single piercing in Cas’ right ear. A man like that should be modelling, Yaz thinks. Startled by her own thoughts, she shakes her head at herself.

She should not be thirsting over the man her best friend is _ clearly _enamoured by.

‘Oh, uh,’ Ryan starts to stammer. ‘This is – this is—’

‘Yasmin Khan,’ Yaz swoops in to save her best friend from melting on the spot. The recognition sparks across Cas’ face as soon as she says her name. ‘I’m Ryan’s friend, he may have told you about me.’

‘Yasmin!’ Cas has completely lit up. ‘Yeah, yeah, oh my God. Ryan’s mentioned you a couple times, yeah. And – d’you remember me from school?’

‘Yeah,’ Yaz beams. ‘Best footballer in Year 3? Of course I remember you.’ Cas laughs, his head pointed down at the ground. ‘It’s my police car parked there; sorry if it gave you a fright.’ She nods to Ryan, who has decided the best course of action is simply to smile. ‘Just popping in to say hi.’

‘Thank God, I thought you were arresting him,’ Cas responds. ‘Glad you ain’t though, I need someone to get me through NVQ class.’

‘Glad I ain’t being arrested either,’ Ryan says, all raised eyebrows and joviality, and he grins when Cas laughs. ‘Have to keep beating you on Overwatch, don’t I?’

Cas shoves him, and Ryan cackles. ‘Fuck’s sake, you beat me _ once _and I never hear the end of it,’ he complains, but he, too, is smiling.

Yaz is definitely third-wheeling here. She folds her arms and waits for them to finish their current discussion about whatever game they’re talking about now. All the while, she cannot stop herself from thinking how surreal the entire thing is. Cas – this current Cas – has always been more of a concept to her than anything else; a name on a screen or a word spoken. Now, he presents himself a real, living being. She can no longer tease Ryan for making up an imaginary boyfriend. Annoyingly.

Cas is a tangible part of Ryan’s life outside of the Doctor. It hits her, then, that she is not.

She is part of his life _ away _ from real life, and she always will be. Left alone to deal with the rest of the world without the Doctor, it is no wonder he has found something to distract him; something more important than the life they have been abandoned by. It’s no wonder he _ wants _to find that something, in Cas. If he left, he’d have something wonderful to come back to.

It hits her, and she hates it: she feels like she’s been left behind.

* * *

_ Graham O’Brien (12:53): Hiya Yaz just wanted to say...just seen Jane in a furniture shop on my way to bowling...think she was looking at dining tables... _

_ Yasmin Khan (12:54): Ryan was on the money then!_

* * *

Yaz is going to drown in all this paperwork. Forget the Limina, or a Dalek, or even old age. She is 100% certain that paperwork will be the death of her.

She really, really should have caught up on these reports when she had the chance.

She groans – the sound is much louder than she expected it to be, and a few heads turn to search for the source of the noise. Embarrassed, Yaz ducks her head down again and pretends it absolutely wasn’t her. Aside from a few coughs, however, and the constant low hum of conversation whispered between colleagues, there doesn’t seem to be any huge disturbance.

She breathes deeply, and straightens up once more. It takes her another second to realise that the top page of her report has stuck to her cheek; she snatches it off and slams it down, wincing when this sound also reverberates in the main office.

She refuses to open her eyes for another half a minute, refuses to acknowledge her wrongdoing, focusing instead on keeping her breathing level.

Reports are going to be the death of her.

She attempts to focus on the words she’s written so far. She can see her handwriting has dropped in quality in a few places, the words blurring together due to that special blend of concentration and exhaustion. Deciphering them doesn’t help her attentiveness, either: her eyes are starting to go funny, making duplicates of the view before her. 

She decides to have a break.

Mindful not to breathe any louder than normal, she – carefully – exhales a deep sigh as she lifts herself out her chair and shuffles over to the kitchen. The clock on the wall catches her eye just as the hour strikes eleven. Three hours down and five, maybe six, to go. The overnight shift is getting to be a problem. God help her.

It would be fine, of course, if she could sleep properly.

She barely acknowledges the kitchen. The kettle is filled and switched on in a blur. Her arms reach out for the coffee, her hands hanging limp until she secures the container, and grips. The struggle to open the container lid, that _ damn _ lid, almost makes her weep. By the grace of God, she is blessed with a lid popping open; the rich aroma hits her nose and a sigh escapes her, entirely unbidden. Next comes the dumping of the coffee into the rose pink mug – after _ finding _the rose pink mug, careful not to drop it even in her state. She pours the steaming water out of the boiled kettle eagerly. In every moment except this one, she would have bothered with the milk. Currently, she couldn't care less. She needs the coffee.

She is a little ashamed to admit that her heart is thumping in anticipation at the sight of her freshly-poured drink.

God, she needs to be awake.

Cradling the precious gift in her hands, she yanks the door of the kitchen open and gingerly steps out. She registers just in time that there is, in fact, another human being right in front of her – thus saving herself from jumping too quickly, and pouring boiling hot coffee over her colleague. She imagines said colleague must be grateful too. She draws herself back just in time, not reacting when the kitchen door slams into her shoulder. She loses a single drop of coffee from the impact, but she is glad the damage is minimal.

‘Sorry, sorry!’ she mumbles.

‘It’s fine,’ is the response, a grumble of a sound.

Yaz blinks. It’s Sunder.

Of course it’s Sunder.

As far as she’s aware, he is also multiple hours into a long shift. He looks it, too. The bags under his eyes have settled into a deeper shade of brown. The ends of his hair have started to splay from the many times he has absent-mindedly run his fingers through it. Even his uniform appears to look too big on him, his shoulders hunched under the weight of it. He clutches a file as if it were a teddy bear, there to help him fall asleep, and not a case on a serious matter.

And she’s glad she’s not the only one feeling it tonight, but his presence is a great reminder of something else preying on her mind. She blinks herself to attention again and straightens up. She sets her face into an expression of curiosity, and hopes it hides enough. ‘Um, sir?’ 

Unlike most of the police officers employed here, Sunder does not attempt to hide his displeasure at being asked a question. His sigh is deep, accompanied by a desperate glance to the kitchen. ‘What, Yaz?’

‘Have you got any further with the burglary case in Burngreave?’ she asks. 

This time, he scoffs. ‘And why are you troubling me with _ that _question?’ he wonders, folding his arms for good measure. He takes a step back, but even with this movement he is more able to angle his head down at her.

Yaz shifts slightly. ‘It’s been a _ week_, surely something would have come up now.’

She wants to say more, something she doesn’t yet know, but the look on Sunder’s face is patiently impatient. Waiting for her.

The penny drops. ‘And… that’s not why I asked,’ she admits quietly, before Sunder can.

‘No, it’s not, is it?’

Yaz straightens her posture. ‘It’s my first burglary, sir,’ Yaz explains. ‘It’s something different. You know how I want to see—’

‘Yes, I know you like being given the “different” things,’ he interrupts. ‘There’s no CCTV, no reports of anyone walking around with a TV. Either the burglar was clever, confident that no one would care, or they didn’t exist.’ Another deep sigh. ‘No evidence, no TV turned up, and one boozy victim.’ Yaz immediately frowns. ‘She’ll be told we can’t find him. It won’t be anything more, Yaz, and that’s it.’

‘Bit rude to call her boozy, sir,’ she hedges.

‘You said it yourself, didn’t you?’

Yaz scoffs. ‘Not in those words! I saw she had a wine bottle – and what has that got anything to do with it?’

Sunder shrugs. ‘If you’re that bothered about her then you can inform her on your next day shift,’ he decides. He closes his eyes for a second, before levelling her with a look. Yaz takes a step back. ‘Don’t bother me about this anymore, okay? God knows I’ve got enough trying to figure out this new bloody missing person _ – _I don’t need you on my back about a dead end.’

She sets her jaw. But she keeps his gaze. Tired they may be, but she’s not prepared to fall out with him.

‘I’ll tell her tomorrow, sir,’ she promises, her voice flat.

His ‘thank you’ is whispered as if she bestowed him a blessing.

As she lets him into the kitchen, her shoulders deflate.

* * *

‘What did you do this time?’ she hears over her shoulder. God give her courage – she feels her entire body jolt with the shock, and narrowly stops herself from jumping about three feet into the air. She turns to her side to see Tomasz setting down his water bottle on the desk next to her. The computer attentive, he keys in his details.

‘You look as tired as I feel,’ Yaz notes, and her body cannot resist forcing a yawn from her lungs to punctuate her point.

It is true – Tomasz does look knackered. One of his eyes won’t open fully.

‘Yeah, blame Uncle Dickhead,’ Tomasz explains. He presses ‘Enter’ on the keyboard with a flourish, and the detail boxes on the screen disappear as the computer logs him in. Tomasz finally settles into his chair as it loads, choosing to wait by turning his head to Yaz and grins. ‘Finally left yesterday, thank _ fuck_.’

‘Only took him a week,’ Yaz responds, and Tomasz snorts. ‘So you’re free?’ she asks, in lieu of anything better to say. ‘And able to catch up on some sleep?’

He doesn’t seem to mind. ‘Can go back to my own bed now and everything,’ he confirms. The desktop loads; he immediately pulls up the local database. ‘You didn’t answer my question though.’

She’s already forgotten it. She glances over to her mug, barely visible amongst the papers around her, and suppresses a desperate whine when she sees it empty. She still has hours to go.

When she looks back to her colleague, she notices him glance at the mug too.

Tomasz drags his hands down his face, but when they lift away, his expression reveals the internal struggle between being awake and succumbing to sleep. The best method, he apparently surmises, is acting as normal. He leans back in the chair and yanks his right foot onto his left knee. That unassuming smile, his boyish good looks, that natural charm: it is a heady concoction that warms him to anyone within his vicinity. Almost two years of knowing him has fleshed out the character before her, but in moments like these she remembers how easy it was to develop a crush on him, a tiny little one.

She looks at him and cannot possibly fathom crushing on him again.

Two years. Soon they’ll be qualified – and on the force together, properly. It feels a long way off, even now. She’s situated back in her real life – and her real life still feels a long way off. She both observes and inhabits; one step away from everything she is immersed in.

It suddenly occurs to her, then, that the Doctor might not see her become qualified.

For how long had she pictured it? Seeing the Doctor in amongst the rows of family and friends, clapping wildly at the ceremony: she has been wishing for this for months. At one of the proudest moments of her life, she’d see the Doctor’s wide smile, the lightness in her eyes, all the vigour of a million stars shining. She’d want to clap back, celebrate the Doctor for being there, for _ being_, to express her gratitude as much as possible. For all the time in the universe, there is never enough of it to express her gratitude.

It is what she always wanted, she realises, ever since she stepped aboard the TARDIS. Her chest constricts.

She tries to breathe through it. Tomasz hasn’t noticed her heart drop all the way down into her stomach: he asks, ‘So, what did you do to make Sunder pissy?’

‘Who said—’ No, not normal enough. She clears her throat and tries again, though her whole body feels like lead. ‘Who said it was me?’

As he retrieves a stack of paper – a new report, Yaz recognises with sympathy – he levels her with a look, one eyebrow raised dramatically. ‘Face it, Yaz, of the “Fantastic Four”, who’s the one who pesters him the most?’

Yaz acquiesces that point. Sunder is no towering authority figure – but the others are not so willing to push. Yaz has a knack of getting herself into difficulty – and it is usually worth it, despite the initial push back. After all, didn’t it lead her to the Doctor? ‘I asked him about the burglary in Burngreave,’ she admits. Her eyes flicker to her mug again. ‘You know, the one Maisie and I looked at?’

‘Yeah, with the woman who flirted with you?’ He rubs at his sleepy eye, but beneath his fist his smirk shines through. When he lifts his hand away, his eye is still half-closed.

She shifts uncomfortably. ‘Yeah, that one.’ She shrugs. She can’t look at him. ‘I just wanted to know.’

‘You’re pretty eager,' Tomasz notes. Yaz’s head snaps back to him. ‘Well, am I wrong? Come on, it’s barely been a week and you know it’s a dead end.’ He pauses; something wicked from his way comes. ‘You sure you weren’t flirting with her too?’

Eager! She glares at him, mouth half-open and her brows furrowed. She scoffs. ‘Tomasz!’

She immediately hears a ‘Shhh!’ from a police officer passing through the aisles – surprise, surprise, it is Tang. He gives her a side-eye as he strides past, and the embarrassment burns her heart residing in her stomach. She and Tomasz immediately duck their heads as one.

‘I’m not blaming you, Yaz,’ he whispers, almost conspiratorially, the corners of his lips lifting up in an easy smile. ‘Maisie said she was attractive, so.’ He shrugs. ‘Probably would’ve done the same.’

The thought of Tomasz trying to flirt with Jane strikes a wave of sickliness at her insides. She grimaces at him. Then comes the onslaught of alarm: it would implicate both he and Jane in something neither of them should be part of.

And speaking of. ‘Whatever happened to being professional?’ she whispers back, an eye roll chucked in for good measure as she returns to her current report. It sits patiently, half-done and mocking. Each gap between the printed headings looks far too spacious, even the boxes with words written in.

She barely takes in the near-unintelligible writing in front of her, the half-asleep scribbles of a confrontation from a week ago – and she waits for him to throw her words back at her; to leave her picking up the shreds of her beloved ‘professionalism’ as she attempts to explain away giving Jane her phone number.

But it never comes. Instead, Tomasz leans back in his seat and preoccupies himself with gulping down the entire contents of his water bottle. Successful, he slams his bottle down and plucks a pen from the Smarties mug on his desk. ‘Best things happen unexpectedly,’ he replies airily. ‘I mean, joining the Force was a kind of sudden decision for me.’ Yaz nods; she knows the story. Tomasz’s drunk self apparently knew him better than his sober self. ‘Always thought I’d join the business, be stuck wiring some lucky sod’s kitchen every day. But I’m not, so.

‘And if I hadn’t joined the Force, I wouldn’t have met Maisie—’ his eyes widen as her name slips out ‘—uh, and you, and Tan. So there’s that.’ He clears his throat, scratches at his temple.

Yaz can breathe out. Tomasz doesn’t know about the phone number. He doesn’t know. She allows herself a small smile though her lungs are aching to laugh it out, the relief bulging in her chest.

Turning her head to watch him, she can see him clench his jaw. His eyes are roaming the view in front of him, but he does not focus on the name and image on his screen; they dart left, concocting.

His heart must be thrumming, Yaz thinks, at this sudden confession. Her own heart is pumping fast, out of a sense of relief more than anything.

‘Did you hear about the high school reunion?’ he blurts suddenly. And closes his eyes, defeated. Maisie on the mind. No backing out now. Not that Maisie would let him, of course.

Yaz allows herself to lean back, to rest. She waits for him to open his eyes and turn his head to her. Though he pleads with his gaze, she will not let him off so easily. ‘And I’m eager?’ she responds, a smile caught at the corner of her lips. 

Tomasz glowers. ‘Shut up, Yaz,’ he grumbles, and she laughs, though it turns into a yawn halfway through.

Lovesick, she marvels. Everyone is lovesick, and they don’t even know it.

In her head flashes an image of the Doctor – the Doctor applauding her at the probation ceremony, the Doctor _ proud _ of her, the way her eyes disappears into her cheeks, the room delighted by her smile. It sends a jolt straight into her bones. She closes her eyes – _ stop it, Yaz, stop it_, she has to stop it. Thinking of the Doctor is no good. It only hurts.

Following those sorts of thoughts, it only panics her.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> honestly i love my ocs so much like maisie? such a _queen_ omg i'm intimidated by how cool she is. i love her. tomasz? an adorable idiot. i love him. cas? my sweet summer child. what a king. i love him. i would die for my fictional characters and that is a FACT


	8. eight: we dance between

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _between the wars we'll stay  
fading echoes spin away  
lost in memories_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> sorry for the late upload - i added a scene in last minute. i missed najia. also, my lovely sister had the audacity to arrive home for the holidays, so that was a big sidetrack.
> 
> as such, this isn't beta'd, so apologies for any mistakes.
> 
> on a side note, ‘strange seas’ was dreamed up one year ago on monday! how the time flies. it's absolutely mad to think that that little thing has got over 800 views already!! thank you so much! happy anniversary, strange seas, for challenging me and helping my writing grow; and for making me fall in love with fanfiction further. i owe a lot to this idea, and i’m so excited for all i have to write for it.
> 
> for this chapter, i'd recommend the lovely ['between the wars'](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6ClR7Wmmo-M) by allman brown!
> 
> a jazz piece is playing in one scene of this chapter - although anything from _kind of blue_ works, [this is what i was listening to](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RPfFhfSuUZ4&list=PL8F6B0753B2CCA128&index=1) when writing. (the video is on a youtube playlist, so enjoy all the jazz music afterwards.)

She’s on patrol first thing.

Sunder is delighted by her no-nonsense approach this time, accepting her fate before he even preempts her frustration. Not that it doesn’t exist anymore – it is always there, simmering underneath the surface – but she already has a goal today, a direction in which to head. Though it will probably take no longer than half an hour, it is already a welcome invitation to distract her from the rest of the mindless shift.

Though, when she gets in the car, she immediately changes her mind on _ when _to do it.

‘City and south,’ she was instructed, so she heads to the more rural areas of the southern boroughs first. She has no doubt the old houses of the old towns will be flattered by the open sky up above, and the sun gracing its presence upon the light-starved streets below. It is a long time coming, to see the sunbeams drift over the slope of roofs, the pointed shadows elongate beneath the abundant trees.

The police car flies smoothly over the undulations of the road; the dead hedges, clustered and twisted branches, become a brown blur that softens the sides of her periphery. Had she slowed to a crawling pace, she would see the first buds beginning to break free, dotted along the green of the ground below the bushes. Behind them, the fields are starting to return to life: brown soil churned in long strips, sown seeds in their first gasps of life; the resurrection of the hardy.

Without a job requiring so much local travel, Yaz would probably never know these parts. So much of her life is firmly embedded in the urban. She is a city-dweller through and through: convenience is an expectation, not a privilege. She cannot imagine living in the constraints of the small town communities here, or tolerating the endemic slowness of life in the villages.

All that she gets from visiting these places, whether in person or on screen, is a sense of entrapment. A place where everyone knows each other is unfathomable, maybe even a little twee. Still, it must be comforting to someone.

It is so alien to her. Her experience is people, and more people, and more people. Mothers and children and the elderly shuttered into new flats and crammed into lifts: the awkward small talk of British people forced to chat out of an intimidating sense of politeness rather than the genuine desire to do so. Headphone-donned music lovers acknowledging each other’s forcibly quiet state. The daily ritual of squinting at someone she might recognise from the floor above, but not being sure enough to confirm. On rare days out with her sister, she has Sonya raising her eyebrows at Yaz to register a particular stranger in the lift. It is the run-up to a giggled outburst when they are free – ‘Oh my God, did you see the _ eyebrows _on that woman?’ or, more often than not, ‘That lad was well fit, right?’

Then they pass by and they are just another person, another in the long list of the city’s people.

People, and people, and people. The endlessness of them, all of them watched over in an indescribable ‘One’, the unknown at least acknowledged by virtue of being a person. On behalf of all of them, she is at war with a threat not known to any of them, only to protect their beating hearts. She’d hate even the unknown to suffer the same way that poor man did, as many on that planet did, that fateful night.

When she drives out to the rural areas like this, when the hills rise up around her and engulf her in the magnitude, her ability to fathom the vulnerable ‘One’ slips through her fingers. Everyone, it is _ everyone _. It is larger, deeper, more massive than she ever is, ever will be. It only ever expands with every mile she covers by her own fortitude. Strength in numbers, she thinks, and tragedy in it too.

She shunters her car off to the side of the country road to let a Land Rover pass. The woman driving – middle-aged from the brief glimpse afforded – raises her hand in a conciliatory gesture. One in the everyone.

Yaz’s car judders when she attempts to recover her position in the middle of the lane. What are they, the three of them alone? No TARDIS, no Doctor, no idea of what the Limina really are. All they have is a sonic screwdriver they can’t really use.

She changes gears and the car responds in kind, a raucous growl eating up the sudden incline. Under cover of trees, she pushes the car to just under the speeding limit. The country road is long, and gloriously free of traffic at this time in the morning. The world accommodates her for this. One of them, so human. 

What use is she, really? Just a traveller, as the Doctor said. No information about the Limina; no help; no plan. She is a sitting duck.

She thinks back to the church yard; the robin and the blackbird. She has always wanted to be a little closer to animals. A little foolishly, she supposes. She has always been disappointed when they refuse to return the same sentiment. She gets it, though. Humans and their constant distractions. When she wants to escape into nature, she finds herself still a foot apart, watching from the outside.

She gets a glimpse of a fellow patrol car, and slams a foot on the brakes. It’s too hard, too enthusiastic. The car jerks in its sudden halt, and Yaz barely has time to recover before she and the other patrol car meet in the middle. She grimaces when she sees who the driver is. Tang nods his head, though even when passing by Yaz can see his slight frown at her unusual driving.

She glowers to herself when she is free of the sight of him. It is impossible for her not to embarrass herself around him, isn’t it?

A call comes through: an elderly woman in the next village has witnessed a fight between two teenagers. With Tang heading out, presumably on another job, this one is up to Yaz. She heaves her acceptance, and shifts into gear.

Shouldn’t they be in school? Or apprenticeships? Or whatever? Not that she can do much about it. She dismisses the thought when she alights on them. The teenagers – the lankiest examples of humanity she’s ever seen – appear not to care about the elderly lady, who has stuck around to watch the unfolding drama. She offers no help, no information; she presides over the shouting and shoving match as if refereeing it. Yaz is simply left to draw them away from their escalating fury. Four teenagers versus her. The uniform puts her at a disadvantage, but her age helps.

Love and loyalty have been tested, and are buckling under the drama of teenage living, from what she can decipher in amongst the internet-infused dialect. A language more alien to her than most of her peers, but living with Sonya keeps her relatively up to date. If she cannot take part in the culture of Instagram and TikTok and what the context of one message means as opposed to another, she can, at least, recognise their importance.

The teenagers don’t acknowledge that, but it warms her to them. Not enough for her to appeal to their calmer, wiser natures. It is not authority they respond to but familiarity. When she snaps at them for giving her more paperwork, it is this they sympathise with; they disband with sullen glares and entwined hands tugging on boyfriends’ stolid figures. For a moment, it makes Yaz stutter with surprise.

But she’ll take it. She’s not picky.

When the teenagers leave, she has to reassure the elderly lady that everything is fine, and that she won’t press charges. She then she has to remind the lady that it is an appropriate measure to take, and, no, just because it was reported to the police, it does not mean they have to be arrested. Both of them depart a little mystified, their mutual bewilderment exposed to the curious residents of the street by the beaming sun.

When she gets back to the car, she spots a middle-aged woman peering at her through the heavily curtained front window. Yaz watches back, amused, and smiles to herself when the woman yanks the curtains shut.

‘Nowt queer as folk,’ she comments to a lonely police car.

There are no other calls for the next few hours. No one needs her to sort out the village youths. Yaz is, truthfully, a little disappointed. The fear that she gets a little kick from the authority keeps her quietly in check – but, no, the residual glow comes from the connection of it. Not wielding the authority but returning it, encouraging them to make the right decisions. It’s nice, in a job filled with paperwork and parking disputes, to get a real reminder of the benefits. Doing right by the community, all that abstract goodness, however small. And no arrests, either.

Still, that residual glow leeches onto the roads she leaves behind. It dims to match the grey as urbanity takes over the view through her windscreen. By ten, she is plunged into the depths of boredom again, alternating between scrolling through her phone and bringing the car into a different area of the city. She gets furtive glances for loitering around streets that don’t want her, but neither do they approach. As long as her key is in the ignition, she’s safe. Her car is much faster, and most likely hardier, than any of the two-seaters the most vocal jumped-up offenders own. She can scroll in peace, if not in enthusiasm.

By eleven, she has been drained of all semblance of joy she could have woken up with. She kicks the car into gear only to stop it down the next street. Then a start, then a stop. Passers-by notice the bright decals with an affronted curiosity, the non-verbalised question clear to her ears – _ What the hell have you come here for? _Then a start, then a stop. The same question, all over again. What the hell has she come here for? She doesn’t know.

Eleven fifteen, and she retrieves the sonic from her glove box compartment. She does nothing with it, merely lets it rest on her lap as the car purrs to keep her warm.

The first open tab on her phone is the forum – _ The Truth is in Yorkshire_. She has taken to scrolling through these endless threads the way she would scroll Twitter. There is less vitriol, the urgency from naive excitement rather than from the sharp edge of cynical opinions, but the content is, for the most part, just as mildly entertaining. 

The forum must be a decade old, if not older – and in her hands she feels she is handling a preservation of history. Some of the usernames are new, some of them seasoned contributors. As the internet has developed, so has the language, and the critical thinking expands as the world turns. Places like these have their own ideologies, their own self-sustaining rules, that envelop events happening to them in real time. The anonymous floating at the edge of time, absorbing it. All to document a few fox sightings and unexpected visitors.

Here are people so certain that the ‘little green ones’ exist in their local area that they have built a community from it. They have dedicated their lives to it.

And she can’t even tell them that they’re true. Sort of.

The first night she scrolled through, she understood why Graham and Ryan had recommended the site. On a site of thousands of contributors, most brandish ‘irrefutable evidence’ that she could refute by brightening the photo here and there. But there appears to be a certain few with more information than ninety-nine percent of the conspiracy theorists; those closer to the scenes of crime. _ Adlerauge329 _ – sometimes known as ‘Tom’ – is the best example: a veteran on the site since 2011, his influence across the site is everywhere, from his debunking to his encouraging. She can tell he is one of the biggest contributors to the site, thanks to the ‘signature’ automatically posted at the bottom of every one of his replies: _ No truth can be disguised when the Eagle’s in the skies. _Though she has not skimmed through every thread on the site – not quite yet – she has seen that mantra every single time. Truthfully, she’s quite bored of it.

He is currently rolling in the popularity of his ‘Alien Metal Squid From Sheffield Reported in London’ thread, thanks to his blurry but not inaccurate pictures of a mess left behind by a single police car. Compiled with corresponding details of mass CCTV blackouts within the area, it is a proof not usually seen on this site. From first glance, his precise way of jettisoning information has seemed immediately familiar – not least the sources from which his information was gathered. He must be secret service, or police. No one else would have uncovered those sources without coming into trouble.

What Ryan and Graham saw was credibility, a shining light amongst the rubble of desperate believers. What Yaz sees is a problem. If it’s someone inside _ her _ force, then she may very well have to keep _ him _safe, too. The Limina may not discriminate between their next victims, but turkeys that vote for Christmas make the meal much quicker.

She has to keep a close eye on her colleagues. As if she does not feel estranged from them already.

(Maisie keeps asking her questions. She keeps staring at her as if watching a newborn lamb, ready to fall over any minute; laboriously checking for any sign of disease, of injury, of disability.)

She purses her lips, a disapproval meant for no one else. She can’t dwell on these. She can’t do this to herself. She has to keep going, keep coping. She has a life to live. Except – she checks the time, and it is only half eleven. She groans. Not for the first time, she empathises with the Doctor’s disdain for linear time.

Out of her funk – she needs to break free from it. Driving will help, surely? The car answers her pleading immediately, pleased to return to being more than just a heater. She drives wherever she wants to drive, because she can, and she does not dwell, she does not dwell; her driving is automatic while she is specifically not dwelling. 

When she realises she has returned to Skye Edge, she almost cries out in frustration. She’s been here three times this past week – just some stupid fields, some nature in the middle of the rest of her life – and she can’t take herself away from it. What’s the point? What is even the point?

It is only then that she realises she did not put the sonic back in the glove box department. 

She groans, and slams her head against her steering wheel. She will not dwell, she will not dwell, she will not dwell.

* * *

It is ten past noon by the time Yaz arrives in Burngreave, her goal the three-space drive overlooking the house. She assumed she would have the full drive to herself, but instead a red Audi A2 has parked halfway across the centre and left spaces; its hood is wide open, stuffed with Sainsbury’s bags. The mere sight of it makes Yaz frown – as she gently encourages the patrol car into the only remaining space, she makes a note to warn the driver inside of selfishness. God knows she does not want to return to resolve another bloody parking dispute.

Then Jane scrambles out.

Ah.

Work trousers and a salmon pink blouse, sheltered underneath a blue jacket. Yaz has never seen a bright outfit seem so lifeless. Is that what an office job does to a person?

Her hair is tied back by a single ponytail. Round by the back of her neck, a wisp of hair refuses to be taken in, and instead they dangle down, rebellious. Yaz opens the door and the _ clop _ping sound of heels draws her attention as Jane edges closer.

She lights up when she peers at the window and sees it is Yaz in the car. In her eyes, a tale of the dull of the day – it vanishes in a single moment. Curiously, her mouth stays the same, the frown impossible to extract from her neutral expression.

She is nothing like the Doctor. 

Yaz manages a wave, heart thudding. Jane, the concept, is not as easy to dismiss when she exists right in front of her.

As she gets out of the patrol car, she points to the Audi. ‘Bit unnecessary, isn’t it?’ Yaz is astounded her voice is so clear. She closes the door and leans on the side of her car, the epitome of calm, as if she did not headbutt her steering wheel ten minutes ago. She can still feel the last throbs of the ache.

On Jane’s face blossoms a red rush. Instead of an apology, though, she offers a shrug. ‘In my defence, I’m not planning to stay long,’ she justifies. The sound of her voice travels right through Yaz, a bolt of lightning designed to immolate her. She must pretend she is not on fire because of it; Jane watches. ‘Lunch hour, and all that. I’ve got about ten minutes to pack this away or I’m probably fired.’

Not enough of an excuse, but Jane clearly has her priorities. And so does Yaz. She looks away to swallow down her apprehension, and turns back to find Jane staring at her again. That strange mix of quiet and sharp. Something just a touch unknowable; the depth of all living beings.

Yaz inhales deeply. ‘Then I’ll help you,’ she offers.

She refuses Jane’s refusal, on the basis of having too much time to listen to her own thoughts. It wins her a smile, and she tempers down her delight at it, though it’s not enough. Jane is stubborn, but Yaz wins the debate when she adds that she came back specifically to talk to her about the burglary.

Jane’s shoulders sag, an action exaggerated by the two full shopping bags now landing with simultaneous _ thuds _on the ground. ‘Let me guess,’ she responds, a flat voice somehow retaining a great deal of emphasis, ‘you haven’t found him?’

Yaz can’t decide whether Jane’s raised eyebrow is out of cynicism or mirth. Vaguely, she wonders why Jane isn’t more upset over someone forcefully entering her new home. ‘Unfortunately not,’ she relays dutifully, behind the wall of a shopping bag carried by two hands. ‘There’s no footage of anyone around the time we believe they would have stolen your TV. You saw no one so you couldn’t provide eye witness details. We can’t help you any further.’

‘Well, that’s shit, isn’t it?’ Jane sighs.

Yaz can’t argue that. ‘Yeah,’ she nods. ‘I’m sorry.’

‘Not your fault, Yasmin.’ With one hand outstretched, Jane slams the car boot shut, digging her car keys out of her jacket pocket to lock it. ‘Honestly, best to know I won’t be strung along. Let you busybodies get back to saving Sheffield.’

‘Right, yeah,’ Yaz says. Her mind is on a loop, the sigh of ‘Yasmin’ clashing against the way she hears it from the Doctor’s mouth; a kinder thing, an awed sound. _ Yasmin Khan, you speak my language_, not: _ it’s fine you didn’t catch my criminal, Yasmin_.

She closes her eyes, breathes out. She hopes the future gives them no reason to merge.

She balances the bag against the side of the Audi as she fishes out her own car keys, and locks the patrol car. This action means she lags behind Jane, a woman on a mission already descending the steps to her house, her two straining shopping bags in tow.

Yaz follows quickly, her eyes gravitating to where the break-in had taken place. There is no sign of any intrusion now, just another front window, bracketed by a new set of curtains.

Jane opens the door to let them in, and walks forward. The entrance way, the brown carpet and the lingering, fusty smell of age. It feels longer now she is in it with only one other person.

Jane does not take off her shoes, nor does she ask her guest to. Not enough time, maybe. There is never enough time. With her back turned to Yaz, she is just a figure. No warm ceiling light comforts them. Shadows command the blue jacket to be just a jacket, trousers just a shape of black. Only her blonde hair, the back of her bob, retains colour. Yaz follows.

Here she was, a week ago, she thinks. In her head, the thought registers as the words of another person. Here she was, investigating a break-in. Looking at Jane for the very first time. Looking at the Doctor’s face on another person inside. Here she was, devastation.

This not-Doctor did not see the Limina with Yaz, did not have tea with Yaz, did not discover Prem with Yaz, did not travel with Yaz. This not-Doctor likes _ Game of Thrones _and Westworld and Billie Holiday, and lounging in pyjamas. This not-Doctor prefers red wine over white. This not-Doctor hates her boss, but tolerates the company.

Here she is, and the thought is numb. Devastation, tucked away to break her later.

Instead of turning right, they career into the kitchen, the second left from the front door. Yaz cannot say she is surprised at the decor: counters crowd each wall except the one leading into the utility. In the centre of the furthest wall stands the fridge, boxy and white against the ornate, flowy carvings in the wooden cupboards, on the edges of the speckled teal countertops. On the tiled walls are special decals, kitschy renderings of farm animals entirely out of place in a borough so close to the city. The sink is embedded in the flow of counters on the side opposite the door, the long, drooping taps a gleaming bronze contrasting the calmer colours of the kitchen. They peek out from the pile of dishes having fast accumulated: plates, cutlery, three mugs and glasses each, and two wine glasses, sitting proud on the side. A habit passed from Doctor to human, she notes, pointedly ignoring it for Jane’s sake.

At once, the three heavy bags are lifted onto the counters next to the fridge.

‘I can’t believe this is the second time I’ve had a police officer in my house,’ Jane says. The comment floods Yaz with a relief she didn’t know she needed. ‘My neighbours must think I’m a drug dealer.’

‘Jane.’ And yes, the name still tastes strange on the tip of her tongue, it tastes different to direct the wrong name to the right face. ‘You’ve had a broken window for almost a week.’ She realises that Jane has already started pulling the contents out from the shopping bags, so she copies. She settles into the repetitive motion easily, Jane next to her being just as quick. Yaz picked the short straw, with the assortment of vegetables not as easy to grasp onto compared to the multitude of tins and jars Jane appears to be producing. ‘If they think you’re the criminal then they’re blind.’

‘Could be a double bluff.’ She catches Yaz’s gaze, and there’s a twinkle in her eyes, a mischief Yaz has only glimpsed a couple of times before. ‘Maybe I am a secret drug dealer, and you’d never know.’

‘Not the best thing to say to a police officer,’ Yaz jokes, touching the hat still on top of her head. At least Jane makes her smile in real life like she does over text.

‘No, but a funny thing to say to a friend,’ Jane responds, eyebrows raised, and half of her mouth lifts up, before she flits off to open a cupboard door and push her tins inside.

Is it genuine? Is it a genuine smile? It’s not the sort of smile the Doctor would make, not a person that so embodies the all or nothing. So the question buzzes in her ears, fills her head, until Jane spins back to the fridge and holds her hand out for something.

The smile lingers, her eyes wide and expectant, and at the same time they are searching each other’s gazes for those answers again.

But the buzzing stops, killed off by the innocence in Jane’s expression. Friends, then. It is that easy. All of her worry, and all she needed to do was simply let Jane joke around her.

So why is it that she feels so tense?

Yaz grabs the first vegetable she can find, and hands it over. Their hands do not touch; there is no cold. She remembers the sonic screwdriver still secure in her glove box compartment, and breathes out.

She blinks and Jane is back, holding a hand out for the next grocery destined for the fridge. So it commences: the passing of vegetables, dairy, light meats, fruit. Jane is neither an organised fridge-packer or a quick one, but it is her fridge.

They spend the remaining minutes chatting.

Every time she talks to Jane, she finds it difficult to suppress the surprise that plagues her. She should not be so surprised that she is so easy to talk to. Of course she is; she came from the _ Doctor _in some way. If she hasn’t inherited the same awkwardness, then she has inherited the ability to speak without prompt. Prone as she is to dip into bitter comments, about whomever or whatever has aggravated her, she is just as prone to a dry humour that throws Yaz for a loop. She is quick, this woman; a woman of hidden depths just like the rest of humanity. 

They talk about their jobs, the desk job Jane has secured at an estate agent’s the other side of town, and her upcoming night out with her colleagues. ‘Is it bad that I don’t want to go?’ Jane grimaces. At this point, she is stretching to deposit a pack of spaghetti inside a cupboard close to where Yaz is standing attentively. Her blouse cannot cover the stretch entirely, and when Yaz looks down, she can spot the cream of Jane’s stomach.

Yaz’s cheeks burn with the glimpse. _ She _burns with it, self-immolation, and turns her head away, chastised.

The closeness doesn’t help. In this proximity, Jane’s perfume is unavoidable: a fruity scent, but otherwise plain. She misses that quintessential Doctor smell: the rust and the peppermint and the engine oil, the unfathomable hints of a brilliant, burning life.

‘You’re only human,’ Yaz justifies for her. Her friend. Her heart is still squeezing painfully.

Yaz is foolish enough to cross her arms. Jane returns to packing the last of the bag’s contents into the fridge, and her outstretched hand almost immediately appears. Yaz must release herself from the protection of the position, and hand over a box of pears. _ Don’t let me eat pears_, she remembers the Doctor pleading, but what exactly can she do? Hold Jane’s pears hostage?

The fridge door closes; a sigh escapes the woman next to her.

‘So,’ Jane says. 

Yaz turns around, training herself into neutrality. She rearranges her face into what she hopes is a hopeful expression. (Maybe the hope that it works is enough hope to make it work.)

Jane can’t keep herself still. She snatches the shopping bags to stuff them into the counter cupboard closest to the door. ‘Thanks for helping me out. You’ve saved my backside a little bit.’

‘Don’t worry about it,’ Yaz waves it off. 

Jane digs out her phone to have a look at the time – and her eyebrows jump. Yaz immediately moves to leave, extending a hand to beckon Jane to move.

As they walk, a question bursts forward. ‘Are you free tomorrow?’ Accompanied by fidgeting hands, brow furrowing to smooth out again. ‘Only I’ve got my dining table arriving and I don’t know about you, but I am… _ shockingly _bad at assembling furniture.’

Nothing like the Doctor, Yaz repeats to herself. Outwardly, she smiles. ‘I’d only be free from seven, sorry. Unless that’s…?’

‘No, no, that’s fine for me – no plans tomorrow night,’ Jane rushes. ‘Come over when you can, it’s not a problem.’ She drops her hands, the half-smile returning. ‘We can watch _ Game of Thrones _or something. Make it less of a desperate plea from my side.’

Yaz chuckles at that. ‘I’d love to,’ she reassures her.

_ Yazzy (12:47): Ryan I’m going round to Jane’s tomorrow to help her set up her dining table _

_ Yazzy (12:47): I’m going round to Jane’s tomorrow _

_ Yazzy (12:48): AGAIN _

_ Yazzy (12:48): And I was round hers today to tell her about the burglar but I helped her pack away her shopping and we talked and _

_ Yazzy (12:50): She is the furthest thing from the Doctor. She’s just so not the Doctor _

_ Yazzy (12:51) It’s like whiplash _

_ Yazzy (12:53): I’m always feeling whiplashed _

_ Maisie Williamson (16:17): so did you tell that woman about her burglary _

_ Yaz (16:49): Yeah _

_ Maisie Williamson (16:50): good _

_ Maisie Williamson (16:51) you were the best person to do it really _

_ Maisie Williamson (16:51): howd she take it? _

_ Yaz (16:55): She was fine about it, she’s got her window fixed and everything _

_ Maisie Williamson (16:57): cool i’m glad _

* * *

_ Yasmin Khan (22:32): Guess who just absolutely destroyed their sister at Monopoly _

_ Yasmin Khan (22:35): Hope you’re having a great night! _

_ Jane Smith (23:11): Proud of you Yaz!! _

_ Jane Smith (23:12): And yeah I am thankss _

* * *

Dawn seeps through closed windows, and Yaz brings her knees closer to her chest. Where her dressing gown parts, her bare legs tense against the cold air.

In the relative quiet of her living room, she replays the video of the Doctor.

The deep orange of the TARDIS unsettles her. Even on the screen of her phone, she can make it out: the subtlety of the warning, the worry. At least, that is what Yaz thinks, just about. Mentions of the TARDIS being telepathic have lent her to interpret the variations in the TARDIS’s displays as emotions, or thoughts. She is yet to get any sort of confirmation from it – but how could she, when the Doctor is gone?

Except she’s not, not here. In this video, she is contained, safe and sound against the realities of their situation. Her expressions are bound by the replay, but at least they are her own. All her frown lines and wide smiles – they are her own. The expressions are the Doctor, and Yaz misses them.

Yaz misses her.

She watches the video on mute. She knows the voice, hears it reverberate in her head all day, contending against the flow of Jane’s own style of speech. But she is the living room, she can’t find her earphones, and the words on here would damn her family even more. That’s not a risk she is willing to take.

Her Dad has already seen the sonic screwdriver. That is more than enough.

She watches the video with an analytic mind, determined to document every expression – every micro-expression. The lift of eyebrows, the pursing of lips. The way her entire face changes when she alights on an exciting thought. She watches to see the Doctor tuck her hair back behind her ear. She watches to see the Doctor’s gesticulations, hands that curl with all her vigour; the hands that can never stay still.

She watches to imprint the video onto her brain. A special kind of punishment, a forced reminder of the loss.

She feels heavy with it.

In comes the sound of padding feet – Yaz immediately interrupts the Doctor and closes the video, flinging a hand onto the remote to switch the TV on. BBC News – right, yes, she’s a serious person keeping up with serious current affairs. Venezuela, and Huwaei, and the Trump investigation. She stretches out her legs on the sofa, keeps her head forward.

The screen flashes bright and bold but it does not register; in her mind’s eye, the beaming smile of a ghost.

The switch to the kettle is pressed down, a _ chunk _sound travelling through the open space. Quietly, her mother yawns. She must make her way over to the living room, because her greeting to Yaz is louder, closer; cheerful, though tiredness drags on the vowels. When Yaz does not answer, she brings a hand to Yaz’s head and strokes it gently. ‘Everything okay?’

Yaz lifts her head up to see her mother upside down, staring down at her fondly. She smiles a half-smile. ‘Sorry, Mum,’ she says. ‘Tired.’ She looks back to the screen. ‘I didn’t see you last night – how’d the interview go?’

‘Good,’ she responds through a yawn, ‘nothing I haven’t done already, but still good. Hotel looks lovely too. Nothing like Mr Spider’s, of course, but…’

That brings out a huff of a laugh. Details of Robertson’s cutting corners leaked not long after their adventure in the hotel – a long, long time ago for her. It is more of a recent development for the media cycle, who appear to love it still. They keep referring to him as ‘Mr Spider’. Not even Spiderman. At least the world is not prepared to deal with two Trumpian figures from the same country.

‘How’d your shift go?’ her mum wonders. Yaz’s throat constricts. ‘You said you were going to tell your Doctor—’

‘Jane,’ Yaz corrects her. _ Your Doctor. _It stings. Her Doctor, her Doctor.

‘—about the burglary yesterday?’

She nods, and her mother’s shoulders deflate.

‘How is she?’ she asks, every syllable washed in concern.

Yaz sits back up, her mother’s hand made to drift to her shoulders. ‘She’s fine, she’s happy.’ Her voice is flat. Why is it so flat? When her mother notices the tension in her posture, and starts massaging them. ‘_Mum_,’ she complains. Thumbs dig into her flesh and Yaz winces. But it does help, marginally.

‘You need it, Yaz, your shoulders are really bad.’ Her mum is away with her own worries. ‘Are you sure she’s okay? Are you sure she won’t want to see the people from – her life before? Has she asked the hospital, have you seen the hospital recently?’

Yaz scowls. ‘I told you, we got advised to pretend like we’re just anybody else,’ she relays. ‘It won’t help her if we come to her pretending to be best friends.’

‘But she needs _ someone_, Yaz. Everyone does. She’s only human.’

Precisely, Yaz thinks miserably. ‘Trust me,’ and it comes out a sigh, ‘she’s doing great.’

The news reporters have moved on from the main headlines of the day, focusing instead on the domestic issues. The next news report is about a recent murder in the Essex area, of a middle-aged man, a genial family man who was enjoying retirement. With no witnesses, and no suspects, police are urging people to come forward.

Yaz frowns. He must have been no older than Graham. She dismisses the burgeoning worry – she’s just overreacting, overexposed to the fear of the Limina.

A particularly tense spot in her shoulder makes her wince audibly. ‘Sorry,’ her mum rushes.

Yaz doesn’t answer.

‘And how are you feeling about it?’ her mother wonders. ‘You haven’t talked about it recently, except about the burglary.’

Yaz closes her eyes briefly, her head swimming from the loosening of her muscles. But her stress is refusing to dissipate, and it grates against the sensations of calm emanating from her shoulders.

‘Mum, please stop going on about it,’ she pleads. ‘I don’t need you to go on about it.’

A tut. ‘I’m not going on about it!’

‘You are!’

‘I’m looking out for you!’ The protestations interrupt the shoulder massage; instead, her mum comes closer to hug her daughter. ‘This is a big thing, Yaz, a life-changing thing, and I worry you’re going back into old habits. Locking yourself away from the rest of the world.’

Izzy Flint. The year from hell. Her heart pounds as she embraces the hug, the reassurance of a mother to a child.

She can’t say anything. She can’t implicate them. She can’t do it.

‘I’m not, I promise,’ she tries, but it falls on unconvinced ears.

‘We’re your family,’ her mum continues. She presses a kiss to the top of Yaz’s head. ‘And you’re still my daughter, even when you’re twenty. If there’s anything wrong, you let us know, okay?’

Head faced forward, she tries not to let her mum see that it shatters her.

* * *

_ Maisie Williamson (08:04): Yaz Yaz Yaz I just had a dream about Tomasz what the HELL is that supposed to mean _

* * *

The nine minute drive from her house to Jane’s largely avoids the main roads into the city, though it does cross the Sheffield Parkway, almost mirroring the route she’d walked with Graham. Still, even on this route, there are plenty of cars: workers returning home late; shoppers exhausted by their day in town; visitors aiming to enjoy the company of loved ones. In such case, she counts as an outlier, but not one of the aimless; her destination neither a loved one or a stranger, a push-and-pull on the heart.

She reminds herself that, technically, she will be in the presence of the Doctor again. But she will be in a fob watch, and Yaz would not run to her unless out of her mind.

The thought doesn’t help. Out of desperation, she yanks on the volume button, and the radio blurts out a dance remix of a pop song. It takes her a minute to recognise it as Lewis Capaldi’s newest hit – surely a conflict of tone. It distracts her, but not enough.

Talking to Jane feels like talking to any person; but she feels so far away and it frustrates Yaz. She needs to know so many things she has not been gifted with yet, for Jane’s safety as well as her own. Every moment spent by her side implicates Jane, but keeps her in their line of sight. It is not enough, not by a long shot.

She needs to know she can keep Jane safe. Most of all, she hopes that this is what tonight works towards. 

In truth, she has no idea what to expect from this night. She fervently hopes she didn’t misread the situation – disappointing Jane might alienate her from Yaz, and that is _ not _an option so early on in the game. (That might mean she has no choice but be as...methodical as she’d hypothesised the first night she met Jane, and on the basics of ethics if nothing else, she’d much prefer not to.) Neither does she want to get her hopes up. They will not be best friends by the end of it – they will be better friends, friends who know about each other’s lives and TV habits. Nothing more.

God. It’s just a nine minute drive, but if she were to be tracked, they would simply have to follow the trail of nervous energy she’s leaving. There are too many times she has to curb her sudden speed.

All the spaces of the drive are filled up – to her relief, Jane’s Audi is parked _ correctly _this time – so she parks her own car just ahead. She takes a moment before she kills the engine, gathering her strength. Thinking back to her conversation with her mother, with her dad. Please let her have the strength.

She closes her eyes and prays, not for herself but for Jane.

The walk down to Jane’s front door is cold; the overcast day hadn’t managed to warm up past 9°C, and in the evening it is plunging fast. She cannot bury her hands into her jacket pockets after she knocks, so she takes to turning over the small box of Maltesers in her hands. It’s probably the cold that makes them shake. Probably.

Her four loud raps are answered a minute later. The door swings open, and in warm light Jane is revealed. Yaz immediately smiles, taking in the sight of her new friend in a new setting: evening. Gone are the office clothes, the lifeless garments that still somehow suited her; instead, she is dressed down in a V-neck olive green top, accessorised with a thin gold necklace, and comfy boyfriend jeans, rolled up at the ends. Her socks are exactly the same colour as her top, which for some reason does not strike Yaz as surprising. Mostly, it’s endearing.

Away from the stresses of the burglary, she can see that Jane is a little more relaxed in herself. There are bags under her eyes – from last night, Yaz thinks – but she smiles easier. The thought strikes her, that the cosy and comforting is where Jane is probably meant to be – and then it strikes her: how easily Jane sits a different life from the Doctor. How easy it is for Yaz to recognise that already.

‘Yaz,’ Jane greets warmly. ‘Come in, make yourself at home.’ When she spots the Maltesers, her smile widens. ‘Bless you, you’re sweet.’

Yaz slips her trainers off next the pair of black heels. It still surprises her to see a lack of boots. She takes her jacket off, for it to be immediately taken to the coat rack by Jane. ‘Thanks,’ she smiles. All of a sudden, the sound of music filters past her the rustling from her movements. Jazz. No – blues.

They head through the living room. A week, and already it has changed from when Yaz saw it last. Gone are the boxes, the signs of an unsettling; in their place is a standalone pile of books, pushed up against the wall. Yaz recognises the black-and-white thriller, right at the top. On the opposite wall, a print has been put up, a black and white modern art piece, lines and circles that tell her absolutely nothing about what they could possibly mean. Most noticeable is the TV, shiny and new and pride of place above a Sky box. The sofas are still the same, the rug still as aged as ever, but at least in the gaze of the wall lights they look more comforting. Daylight is not so kind.

The source of the blues is, unsurprisingly, the record player. When Yaz drifts over, she picks up the record sleeve, taking in the dark tones, the simple text: Miles Davis, _ Kind of Blue_.

‘One of the greats,’ Jane notes. ‘One of the fathers of cool jazz, astounding trumpeter. This album’s in my top five.’

‘I really like it,’ Yaz says.

Jane keeps her gaze, a half-smile forming. ‘As you should.’

The doors into the dining room are wide open, a glimpse into the current chaotic organisation. Different parts and pieces of the to-be-assembled dining table are wrapped generously in bubble wrap, plastic foam, and bags of screws. To the side, Jane has already placed screwdrivers and an allen key. The paper manual lies at the very centre of it all, laid down flat in the middle, as if it is the leader about to command the attentive chaos gathered.

Yaz scratches her head. Right, a challenge, then.

The door to the kitchen is situated in the middle of the adjacent wall, and this is where Jane glides to. ‘I’m having a glass,’ she announces. With a cocked head, she wonders, ‘Do you drink?’ At the shake of Yaz’s head, she adds, ‘I bought Schloer?’

‘That’ll be great, thanks.’

While Jane prepares their refreshment, Yaz takes a tentative step into the middle to collect the holied manual. At first, it reads as a jumble of technical terms and detailed instructions, but she perseveres, and the plan starts forming.

Jane returns, passing her a wine glass and kneeling down next to Yaz. In her glass must be white wine, hints of green around if she looks hard enough. Yaz’s own glass cradles a berry pink colour.

‘I know I’m already in my twenties,’ Jane comments, ‘but this makes me feel like I’ve finally achieved adulthood. Glass of something nice and assembling furniture. God, I can’t believe I’m actually enjoying this.’

Yaz chuckles. ‘You won’t be in a bit. When my parents decided to redecorate, it was usually me or Dad doing all the furniture.’ She pauses, and the memories fill her line of sight. Hauling various bits and pieces had been excellent exercise, and a great way to warm up. There’s not much she can do about her turtleneck, but she pushes up her sleeves in anticipation, her left sleeve a more difficult venture what with the glass in her hand. ‘Now I think about it, it was usually just me. Trust me, it gets way worse than this.’

‘That sounds about right.’ Jane lifts her glass. ‘To adulthood. “It gets way worse than this.”’

Yaz laughs, and the glasses collide with a dainty _ clink_.

Right, so how are we going to go about this?’ Jane asks Yaz an eyebrow raised. A challenge as much as anything.

First, they get to work unwrapping everything, throwing the protective packaging into the living room. Then comes corresponding screws with all the pieces, making calm out of the chaos. It is a mammoth job in itself, and the satisfaction that comes with rearranging everything into orderliness is pretty tangible.

Throughout this process, conversation wraps around Yaz’s directions, meandering from a very short, closed conversation about Jane’s outing last night to their Yorkshireness. Jane has no love for her home city of Huddersfield and Yaz is ambivalent at best about Sheffield, but they meet in the middle through their love for their county regardless of personal experience. ‘You can take the Yorkshirewoman out of Yorkshire…’ Yaz starts, and Jane grins in response.

She breezes through her life story, not wanting to stop in Memory Lane. She lambasts a ‘largely dull upbringing in a largely dull place,’ and as she recalls the basics, her frown solidifies. ‘My mum died when I was seventeen, my dad at nineteen. I wasn’t close to them anyway, so the fact that they couldn’t support me was just… same as usual.’ Jane shrugs. ‘More a matter of making something out of myself, than making them proud.’ 

‘And now you’ve made something out of yourself.’

‘I’ve made it seem like a good thing to be the only living relative left when a house-owner dies,’ Jane shoots back. ‘Which is still something, but it’s a hell of a something, isn’t it? Don’t get me wrong, I’m grateful for this place, God-awful wallpaper and all, but it’s not the happiest of situations.’

Yaz is not entirely sure what to say to that. She nods, perhaps a little too quickly, and places the last screw down next to the corresponding table leg.

‘Sorry, Depression Central over here.’ Jane takes a gulp of her wine.

‘No, no, it’s fine.’ Yaz excuses, waving a hand to dismiss the embarrassment. ‘I’m still getting to know you. And even if I wasn’t, it’d still be fine.’

Jane takes it graciously. ‘What about you, Yaz, what’s your story?’

There is truth in the notion that for the overwhelming population, it is easier to talk about oneself than other people. Half of her is mind on assembling the table – she interrupts herself to parrot instructions from the manual, and explain them again so they can actually understand it – and together they work smoothly, lifting parts when necessary, passing over pieces when required, and concentrating on their individually instructed tasks without much trouble. The other half of her mind is on summarising her entire history, describing her family as succinctly as possible, without risking any mention of aliens, adventures or otherwise.

Sometimes she remembers her Schloer, and her mind gets distracted. 

She leaves out the part where she met the Doctor. Intertwined as their lives are, she cannot leave Ryan and Graham out of the story: they are intrinsic to her as she knows she is to them. She blusters a haphazard half-summary of how they met, but it is enough for Jane, who concentrates on securing the last table leg.

‘So I travel, when I can, with Ryan and Graham. We’re an unusual three, but it’s nice. We make it work,’ Yaz finishes. ‘You’ll have to meet them, Jane, they’re really great.’

Jane straightens up again, one eyebrow crooked. ‘I’d really like to, actually.’ She ducks down to make sure the leg is still secure as she takes away the allen key. When she shuffles back on her knees, the table stands without human support. ‘Honestly, I know very few people here. It’d be nice – to make friends outside of my job.’

Yaz stands up to survey their work, wiping her brow. They’ve done a good job on this one. Sturdy and modern. If only the rest of the furniture in the room matched. She looks forward to lounging on the sofa, letting the dramas of Westeros wash away the ache of her recent exertion.

She remembers Jane had spoken, and assures her, ‘I’ll get on it.’

Jane lets languid smile spreads in response; slow and soft, and sweetly uninhibited. The light catches her eyes, and green with golden flecks come ablaze. Her head angled upwards from her kneeling position by the side of the table, her hair the right side of messy.

And Yaz’s breath falters. 

If Jane notices, then she doesn’t say. But Yaz does. When she gulps down her Schloer and plucks Maltesers from their box, with _Game of Thrones _flashing gloomy in front of them both, the shame burns her cheeks. It is all she can think about.

* * *

It is not until later, until she is free in the freezing night air, that she finally remembers to check her phone.

_ Ryan (17:43): sorry i know you’re with jane right now but _

_ Ryan (17:44): i’m walkin nugget in sum fields near ur flat _

_ Ryan (17:45): skye edge fields i think _

_ Ryan (17:46): and it’s the tardis _

_ Ryan (17:47): yaz the tardis is here _

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> schloer is the best non-alcoholic drink and you can't change my mind
> 
> as this will be the last chapter before christmas - i wish you all a very merry christmas, and happy holidays!! have a wonderful time with loved ones, and if you ever want to reach out during this holiday season, i'd be happy to have a chat!


	9. nine: we are ghosts on islands

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _a tethered call and you left  
and the void was all that there was_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> apologies for being a day late! i severely underestimated how much time i'd be spending with family, so as a result very late friday night/saturday was genuinely the only time in the week i was able to write anything. also, was aware i was meant to upload at 2 but i did not know we'd be having sunday lunch with a family friend - until we had dinner with said family friend.
> 
> both as an apology, but also as a way to finally make up for the one chapter deficit, i'm uploading this chapter BUT ALSO the next chapter (ryan's vlog!) **tomorrow**, so watch out for that too!
> 
> this is not beta'd, so all mistakes are my own!
> 
> for this song, i'd recommend the gorgeous ['voices'](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q-cPe4wtTTw) by late contender for one of my favourite artists of the decade, the wonderful talos.

She keeps the car close to the fields, parked and secure on the nearest road. Her car keys poke through the middle and ring fingers of her right hand. 

The natural world turns grotesque in the night. The calm and amiable sights of the park skitter away into the dark, and in their places linger the knife-sharp wisps of ghostly grass, like skeletal fingers reaching out the ground to fall round her boots, grasping onto them. The trees block out the moon and the citylight, their leering a simple promise to swallow the comforts of sight. Rocks on the rough path lie hidden in plain sight, the night cloaking their comings and goings so they can ram into her toes and trip her up as they please. They are joined in their endeavour by the ground itself – a quick-lurching thing, the incline obscured by the smooth, flat road beneath. The natural world, so welcoming to her in the day, does its best to keep her out when the sun sets.

In her left hand, she grips her phone, with the torchlight on. Bright purity, an unmistakable guidance, an unmistakable call: suddenly the rocks beneath her feet are made known, their intentions dashed; the trees come to steal her away are given no choice but to recede back into the safety of each other, disgusted as they are by the show of light. Where wind whips around her and fools her for night ghouls, the torchlight assuages her fears. She is frightened; not falling. 

Though, tonight, she has failed.

Ryan picks up the call. ‘Ryan?’ she says.

_ ‘What you phoning me for?’ _ His voice sounds far away. Hidden in itself. A rustling, then a groan. _ ‘Ain’t it like eleven or somethin’?’_ His voice is clearer now. Has she woken him up?

Why did she call him? She doesn’t know. She just slammed her thumb down on the button. Hoped he’d pick up. And he picked up. He knows she needs to talk. To hear a voice that isn’t hers.

‘It doesn’t – Ryan, I can’t find the TARDIS.’ She turns around. All she sees are the trees. Waiting to take her. Maybe they should, maybe they should. More grass waving in the night. Jane, kneeling. Maybe they should. ‘I’m at Skye Edge. I can’t find the TARDIS.’

_ ‘Wait, aren’t you meant to be at Jane’s? Why you at Skye Edge?’ _

‘I just left Jane’s – I got your texts – I hadn’t seen them before. Are you sure it was Skye Edge? Are you sure she was here?’

_ ‘Yaz, Yaz, Yaz, stop.’ _

‘What?’

_ ‘Get home, Yaz, it’s past eleven and that won’t be safe.’ _ His voice muffled temporarily. _ ‘Far too late, mate, you’ve gotta get home. What if them Limina find you looking for the TARDIS on your own?’ _

‘But you saw her – you saw the TARDIS.’ She swallows. She can picture – if not feel – her hand start to shake. Car key out. She’s protected, right? She’s fine. From humans.

_ ‘Yaz, seriously. Go home. We can look tomorrow if you want.’ _

Tomorrow. But they don’t even know if the TARDIS will come back. ‘What if she doesn’t come back, Ryan?’ She can picture – not feel – the frown on her face. She can picture her quick breathing. ‘What if she doesn’t come back and we’re stuck here? And Jane is always Jane?’

Kneeling, keening. She wants the TARDIS back. She wants sense back. She wants the Doctor back. Cold, something warm on her cold face, a trail.

_ ‘Yaz, mate.’ _ His voice is so level. _ ‘Listen to me, okay?’ _

She nods. Quick breathing. Lingering grasses. 

_ ‘You’re gonna walk back to your car and you’re gonna keep breathing, you’re gonna get home and you’re gonna tell me when you’re home, and we can have a look tomorrow for the TARDIS,’ _ Ryan instructs. _ ‘Deep breathing, yeah?’ _

Look tomorrow for the TARDIS. She can do that. Her legs move of their own volition, away from the fields, away to the road. Ryan stays on the phone, going through his plan tomorrow so they can find a time to meet up. _ ‘Best time’s when I’m walking Nugget,’ _ he says. _ ‘Hey, you can meet Nugget tomorrow!’ _and the dog, she thinks of the dog. She thinks of the dog because she thinks of Jane, too much, of the TARDIS too much. She thinks of these things until she is inside her car, the doors locked from the inside; the heating on and the familiar shapes warm under her hands.

The torchlight of her phone is off. And she breathes in to fill in her caverns; breathes out to dispel the worry settled there, a silent killer.

Five minutes later, she has her head leaning against her seat’s headrest, the phone pressed up to her ear still.

‘Thank you,’ she whispers. ‘That was weird, I didn’t enjoy that.’

_ ‘Same,’ _ Ryan replies, the late hour creeping back into his voice. The late-night croak, crackly baritone. _ ‘I was getting worried. And I didn’t want you to be alone.’ _

She doesn’t answer that. She doesn’t want to acknowledge that. Returning to loneliness is never as easy as the first luring in.

‘Sorry you had to see that.’ Kneeling, gazing up. ‘Um – hear that,’ she corrects herself. ‘That was—you didn’t have to—’

_ ‘Mate, it’s fine, it’s fine. Used to ‘em by now. Just wanna help.’ _ The acknowledgement digests in another rustling; a duvet being pulled over a body. _ ‘D’you get ‘em a lot?’ _

Yaz clears her throat. The expulsion of air is a satisfying movement: the measured staccato bursts, controlling what goes in, what comes out. ‘Not for a long while now,’ she admits. ‘I – I didn’t expect…’ Yaz shakes her head. No point in dredging up awful memories. ‘Ryan, I should start driving. The adrenaline’s gonna abandon me otherwise, and I don’t wanna crash.’

_ ‘Right, right,’ _ he responds. _ ‘No calling. Text me when you get back, alright?’ _

‘Of course. I promised.’

_ ‘And we can talk about this tomorrow – if you want? Don’t have to, obviously. Just a suggestion.’ _

‘I know.’

_ ‘See you soon, then.’ _

‘Sleep well. And thank you.’

_ ‘No problem, Yazzy. Text me.’ _

Ryan hangs up before she can, but she doubts he will sleep. Not until she confirms her landing, anyway. And she’ll do it for him.

Even as she burns with all the fear of it, he is there to smother the flame.

She turns the key in the slot, and the car rumbles to life. Too cacophonous for the night to encroach.

_ Yazzy (23:23): Back home _

_ Yazzy (23:24): Thanks and sorry _

_ Ryan (23:24): stop sayin sorry _

_ Ryan (23:25): + go to sleep _

* * *

There is a bustle to the HQ she doesn’t expect when she pushes through the doors. While she regains her sense of alertness, blinking through the exhaustion attempting to push her eyelids closed, the world around her seems not to sympathise. A uniformed colleague rushes past, clipping her shoulder as she grips onto the door handle – no apology, no acknowledgement – busy repeating codes into his radio to confirm his whereabouts and his destination. Another walks past, radioing into Forensic. At the desks, her colleagues man their phones, swapping vital information and scrounging for more details. Some stand up, bent over with one hand splayed flat on their desks, looking through notes and maps. The shrill sound of ringing phones and urgent whispers fill a room often so stuffed with exhaustion.

The desk dividers, usually a buffer between a sleepy officer and their suspecting superior, stand guard against her now. They obscure any information that might make sense of this unnerving urgency. All she sees is the panic, the mobilisation – and for what, exactly?

All of a sudden, Yaz wakes up.

As far as she’s aware, she’s meant to be sorting through her outstanding reports, making headway into the mounting pile she ignored in lieu of endless driving. Though, now, she is not entirely sure. The hairs are standing up on the back of her neck. As she walks, few acknowledge her. It is all about ‘retrieval’ and ‘questioning’ and ‘informing’. Terms she can’t place in any context.

Over at the back of the desks, Maisie sits on her own. Of course, she shares this shift with Maisie. Above the desk divider, she blinks up at Yaz, her eyes wide and round. And glassy. She appears to be the only one not moving at double speed. Not at double speed, not at any speed at all. Her shoulders are hunched, her hands gripped around her own biceps. When Yaz frowns at her, concerned, she opens her mouth only to close it again. Yaz isn’t close enough, hasn’t reached her yet.

Dimly, Yaz realises this is the first time Maisie has not trusted her own voice to carry.

Her stomach drops.

Her pace quickens – she needs to reach her friend, now, _ now _ – when Sunder blocks her line of sight. His mouth set in a line instead of a frown is just as unnerving as the rest of this; when he gazes at her, he does so without judgement. Instead, he steadies her momentum with a certain hand on her shoulder, and faces her squarely.

‘Come with me,’ he instructs, only letting go of her arm when she nods. He turns to Maisie, beckons her.

She rises without a word, and they are marched, double speed, into another meeting room. The world is spinning away from her. She reaches out to Maisie, to grab her hand, for herself as much as for her friend.

This room is smaller than the main meeting room – Yaz recalls their briefing there, the morning after the Doctor’s disappearance, and stiffens – but it is styled in much the same way: the same beige carpet, white walls; an older, stuffier look than the recently-decorated main office. No blue here, no question of anything to distract them. Her eyes glaze over the interior but flicker back to the Sergeant, who has settled on top of one of the tables crowding the middle of the room. He kicks aside a chair that would otherwise be in his way, and watches as it rolls a foot or so away. With a deep sigh, he folds his arms. It is a usual behaviour for him, but the careful blankness of his face makes it all wrong, all too deliberate.

Beside her, Maisie has taken to gripping onto Yaz’s arm.

‘What’s going on?’ Yaz demands. She is trying to get the world to stop spinning. A side effect of exhaustion, the slow drain after a panic attack, or just her normal response to a world whirling out of control? She doesn’t know. She doesn’t know. She breathes out. ‘Is everyone okay?’

Sunder looks down and clears his throat, pausing a moment before looking up at Yaz. ‘There has been an incident,’ he begins, ‘involving two of our officers, in the Bradfield-Loxley area. Both officers were found in a crashed patrol car just at the edge of a copse on a country road at approximately twenty past nine this morning.’

‘Which officers?’ Yaz asks. Her voice stronger, ‘Sir, please.’ Maisie’s grip has not wavered or tightened – she must have already been briefed, Yaz thinks. She’s here for support. She’s Yaz’s support.

She knows she’ll need it.

‘Tomasz and Mikey,’ he informs her.

Sunder has slipped into first names. Yaz’s despair starts bubbling. Not those two, she thinks. Please, not those two.

Sunder breathes in, squares his shoulder, and forces out the next sentence. ‘Mikey was found dead at the scene—’

‘_No_—’ Yaz breathes, and the despair breaks.

‘—and Tomasz was found unconscious, but breathing. No major injuries except whiplash and a broken arm. He’s being sent straight to hospital, to rest and to heal, but he won’t be returning to patrol for at least six weeks.’

For someone who has already been briefed, Maisie still reacts visibly to the news of Tomasz’s lucky escape. Her whole body seems to loosen with the news, as if hearing it again has embedded itself further into her heart.

And, Yaz, too is dogged by the relief. Tomasz is okay – or, at least, he _ will _be, in about six weeks’ time – but Mikey…

She collapses against the wall, taking Maisie with her. At least Maisie has the good sense to wrap her arms around Yaz’s side.

Mikey didn’t have much family, just one son around her age. He always treated the younger officers like his own. He was the only one outside of the Fantastic Four to make her laugh whilst on patrol.

And now he’s gone. The laughter dies with him. She pictures it now, leaking out of the room, out of her life, as the world around him fades to black.

It is always the bright ones, isn’t it? The ones that bring joy to a room that needs it. So the light leeches out, and in their place an awful darkness. Another void.

‘All of this is tragic enough but, from what we’ve heard through the radios so far, we can’t confirm the circumstances in which they crashed,’ Sunder continues, and Yaz’s head whips up. ‘We can’t confirm it was a collision – but we can’t confirm it wasn’t. Not enough time on the scene, at the moment. Morley and Tali are already there, but more of Forensics are heading over to analyse everything they can. Mazurek will be a great help in figuring out exactly what went wrong, but I suspect he won’t be talking for hours yet.

‘That’s why I want you to go,’ Sunder announces suddenly. Yaz stares at him. ‘He’ll have family over, familiar faces, but when he’s being questioned he needs friendly faces from within the Force. Obviously we’ll send our detectives but it’s a bit of reassurance for him _ and _you.’ His eyes flicker to Maisie briefly. ‘I know how much he means to you. Fantastic Four, and all that. Remember you’re there to help get information, too, though.’

Yaz nods, her head slightly bowed. Through a lump in her throat, she says, ‘Thank you, sir.’

Beside her, Maisie mumbles the same response.

‘I’ve signed your visit to the hospital off; you’ll be going tomorrow. Tan will be joining you. For now, it’s desk duty. If you need to sign off, then let me know. A couple already have.’ Yaz can already guess: Noiya Tali, Mikey’s not-yet girlfriend; Kalen Jackson, his partner in (stopping) crime. ‘Main office is hectic right now so for peace and quiet, I’d suggest moving your paperwork here.’

His abrupt parting, just a quick nod, is still Sunder to the core, and solace flickers warm briefly at the thought. Then, they are following behind, and parting to retrieve their pens and reports from their desk, to return to the smaller meeting room. It all happens faraway; or under water, Yaz isn’t sure. An officer dead, an officer unconscious – it all feels utterly surreal.

The tragedy is draped across them all like cloaks, weighing down their shoulders. Yaz can barely lift hers up. She eventually gives up, resting her head on her crossed arms, staring at the wall opposite until time itself surrenders its effect on her.

Maybe if she stares hard enough, Mikey will emerge from the wall, laughing heartily and reassuring them of the well-done prank.

‘I can’t believe it,’ Maisie breathes. Yaz does not move. ‘Mikey gave me a noogie yesterday. In the kitchen. Tomasz freed me. We were all laughing.’

Briefly, the image flashes across her eyes: of Tomasz, that charming lad, buried under tubes and breathing apparatus. Bruised and bandaged, but alive, so alive. It cuts to Mikey, his huge form wheeled off in an ambulance under white cloth, an arm lolling off the side of the stretcher. The cold of the morgue, the cold of the space he leaves behind.

It is such a clinical atmosphere that descends over the two of them now in their respective places: one fighting to keep awake in a hospital bed, one already lost. Two bright, warm souls – they don’t deserve it. It feels wrong, so wrong. Yaz rubs at her arms to lift it off herself.

‘He was just so – you couldn’t not hug him, you know? Even when he messed up my hair – my _ bun _– I told him off then hugged him afterwards. I could feel his laugh shake his entire body. He was that huge. Felt like an earthquake. God, what’s Will gonna do? His dad, his biggest hero. Fuck. Fuck.’

And then, quietly: ‘What the fuck is Tomasz gonna say?’

* * *

Yaz excuses herself to the bathroom. As soon as the door to the main office opens, the sound bombards her: a whole office trying to mitigate the damage done by Mikey’s death. Four desks vacated: Tali, Jackson, hers and Maisie’s. She has to look out for them, keep track; everyone else is running around, survivors of a bomb. Yaz’s exit is as speedy as she can manage.

In the bathroom, she leans against the wall of a cubicle. Four walls and tall, compact; she thinks of Skye Edge field and that dip into panic, the desperation, that _ need _ for the TARDIS to be there. She’ll go back, after her shift, and she’ll barely have anything to say. But she’ll find it, she _ will_. She holds onto that thought, desperately, as a distraction for her next move.

She digs out her phone from her pocket, and sends a text.

_ Yaz Khan (12:13): One of my colleagues died today _

As soon as she presses send, the world catches up to her. It rocks back into position and halts. The feel of it makes her breathe in, a protective gesture against what she’s already done. Stupid, stupid. Jane isn’t the Doctor. She can’t do that to her. That unbidden image leaks back into her mind and she slaps her hands to her face, the edge of her phone bumping into the side of her nose.

It buzzes.

_ Jane Smith (12:14): Oh God I’m so sorry to hear that :( were you close? _

_ Yaz Khan (12:15): Not that close, but he was still my friend _

_ Yaz Khan (12:15): Sorry, I shouldn’t be burdening you with this _

_ Jane Smith (12:16): No it’s okay honestly _

_ Jane Smith (12:17): You’re my friend, want to make sure you’re okay _

_ Jane Smith (12:17): Do you want to call? _

There was such openness in her gaze then, such vulnerability, as she knelt. And Yaz hates it. She hates that the image won’t leave her and she hates that a part of her simply can’t hate it.

She looks up to the white tiled ceiling, the criss-cross of panelling and dotted with age and mould, and Yaz decides she hates it all.

_ Yaz Khan (12:18): I’ll be alright, but thank you. Maybe I just needed to tell someone, get it off my chest _

_ Jane Smith (12:20): Yeah makes sense _

_ Jane Smith (12:21): You know I’m here for you if you ever need to chat okay? _

_ Yaz Khan (12:23): Yeah, thank you so much _

Yaz exits her messaging app and scrolls through her gallery, stopping at her most watched video. The thumbnail is not of the Doctor, just the TARDIS interior, but even the sight of it fills her with something else – a myriad of emotions, swelling around the grief, sheltering her from it, but itself nothing she can quite put her finger on. It doesn’t matter, anyway; it’s a distraction, away from the grief, away from her building guilt, away from all she runs from.

She presses play and the Doctor appears, and something in her settles.

* * *

‘There you are,’ Maisie breathes a sigh of relief when Yaz returns. Her gaze is loose, tumbling over to where Yaz closes the door softly, the _ click _a quiet acknowledgement of success. ‘I’ve been needing you to check my spelling for about half an hour.’

Her eyes are newly red, rubbed raw by fidgety hands. When Yaz looks over, she sees very little progress made on the report her friend must have started weeks ago. Memory fades, but the task does not. The age-old battle of the exhausted police officer.

Yaz collapses into her chair with no sense of grace whatsoever, her _ humph _an unexpected product. Relief soothes the aches of her sleep-deprived body, spreading calm down the lengths of her legs, the balls of her feet. Standing up for – was it really half an hour? – has done her in. The entire day has done her in. She wants nothing more than to go to sleep, to curl herself up in sunflowers and be done with it. Sheltered, cocooned. No death, no Jane, no Limina.

A girl can dream, can’t she?

With no fuss, she checks Maisie’s spelling – it’s fine, just a victim to the plague of looking at a word for far too long – and returns to her own. Another stolen car, from a week ago. She’d recognised the car, her _ neighbour’s _stolen car, outside the house of a thief known to the police. The coincidence! When the thief stepped out of his house to immediately hurry back in, she’d radioed in, asked for confirmation and backup from the traffic cops. She hung around to witness the arrest, but that was it. Out of her hands, like so much else. And, still, she has to write about it.

She attempts to concentrate, but Maisie scoots her chair over and rests her head on Yaz’s shoulder. They stay like that for a while.

Yaz notices that Maisie’s hair turns auburn under bright light. It helps her not think.

‘How are you feeling?’ her friend eventually murmurs, lifting her head off Yaz’s shoulder. She stays close, though, their proximity a mutual benefit.

Yaz shrugs. ‘How are _ you _feeling?’ A million dollar question.

Maisie can’t face her anymore. She gears herself up for her next question. ‘Relieved,’ she admits, ‘that it wasn’t Tomasz. Which is fucking awful, isn’t it?’ She slams her hand down on the table when she spits out that last sentence; Yaz jumps.

Yes? No? Maybe? ‘No,’ Yaz decides. She shakes her head, hesitantly. She hardly views herself the last word on morality. ‘No one’s a perfect griever.’

Maisie turns around, her whole face close to Yaz. From this close, she can see the grief and shame etched into her expression already, tugging the corners of that wide smile down. Eyebrows knitted together impossible to untangle. ‘Can you stop doing that?’

Yaz swallows. ‘Doing what?’

‘Being so damn perfect and putting us all to shame.’ There’s no vitriol behind her words, none at all. ‘Being so...so good and saying the right things and taking things so well even when they’re shit, like this.’ It builds, and builds, and builds, so close to Yaz, and she wants to put her arms up, shield herself, but Maisie needs her to be exposed, to put the swelling emotions _ somewhere_. ‘And then you say nothing about the things that are _ actually _ hurting you and I feel so far away from you, I have for months now, you just listen and don’t ask, don’t ask for a helping hand – you just _ are _that helping hand, always, and that can’t be healthy, Yaz, not for you or for any of us. So can you please not do that?’ She breathes in, lungs desperate. ‘Can you please cry or tell me I’m wrong and, fuck, a man’s just died, and can you please talk to me in a way that doesn’t feel like shutting me out? Because we just lost someone and I need you to tell me how that hurts. I need you back.’

The words ring out in the room. Yaz can barely breathe.

_ I need you back. _

_ I’m so sorry. It’s the only way. _

_ I need you back. _

Maisie starts to lower her gaze and move away, but Yaz places a hand on her left arm, and she stops. The black sleeve is such a contrast to the pale of Maisie’s skin, the fist bouncing ceaselessly. Yaz is so still, stiffened with everything. All the grief is packed tightly into her every corner. If she moves she will crack.

‘I reacted so badly to Jane because she reminds me of someone I lost,’ Yaz admits, and it’s a start, it’s a start. ‘A friend of mine. We travelled for a bit, got to know her.’ She swallows, unable to keep Maisie’s curious gaze. ‘It wasn’t for long, but it was the best thing in the world. She was the best thing in the world.

‘And – Jane looks like her. _ Exactly _like her. I couldn’t believe it at first, how similar they looked, until she opened her mouth and I knew she was the wrong person. She’s so different, she’s not like the – not like my friend at all. But she’s nice. So.’ Yaz shrugs lamely. ‘She’s my friend.’

‘Why are you still in contact with her?’ Maisie wonders. ‘Yaz, that’s actually mad. Aren’t you just thinking of – your friend the entire time?’

Because of reasons Maisie can’t understand. Not that she can say that. Yaz closes her eyes; she’s already done enough to shut Maisie out. All the unintended consequences of the Doctor. ‘I can control when the ghost haunts me,’ she tries, opening her eyes reluctantly. ‘If I’m control, I can ease my pain. It’s not that it’s not painful. It’s – so painful,’ she adds, choking on that last sentence a little. ‘But I have...more control over it.’

It’s one of the worst lies she’s ever told herself. But she’ll batten it down, drown self-awareness until no breath remains. She _ needs _this. She needs to see this through.

Jane needs her.

‘And Jane doesn’t know?’ Maisie questions, eyes searching Yaz’s.

She shakes her head, mutely.

‘Oh, Yaz,’ Maisie breathes. ‘I’m sorry.’

Eager arms wrap around her shoulders, and squeeze, and it feels like crossing a bridge. What once she burned now mends, the lattice of metal and stone and scaffolding repaired and falling into place.

‘I’m gonna miss Mikey so much,’ Yaz murmurs into Maisie’s arm.

‘Me too,’ Maisie responds. Her bottom lip is trembling.

When Maisie hugs her, it feels like there are four people who receive it. Mikey is in there somewhere, and Tomasz, and Jane. All ripped apart and drifting in the grief, the six of them. But there are arms opened wide to catch them.

* * *

The sky is clear, and the stars are out tonight. When she leaves Park Hill, she stares up at them. Let them speak to her just as much as they do the Doctor – she needs their guidance tonight. When she closes her eyes, she still sees them, and under them she settles, temporarily. So much to weigh her down, but the sight of the stars will always lift her.

On with the night. Her boots feel heavy when she trudges over to Graham and Ryan’s. The descending night has sent her straight to her coat, her scarf, her gloves, and when she walks, she buries her chin in the warm wool adorned round her neck. She hides herself from the world; from what she is about to do.

The previous night lingers like the smell of nicotine on a smoker’s clothes. It grasps at her, and when she tries to pick it off, it stretches and bends around her fingers. She feels it in the heaviness of her bones, her limbs, her brain; the fug that refuses to leave. The world stopped spinning so visibly hours ago, but secretly she thinks it still does, just under the radar. Since February, since the day they lost the Doctor. 

Maybe this will help to right it. Maybe, maybe not. Given the last month, it doesn’t seem likely.

She rings the doorbell around ten past six. Immediately, she is answered by a cacophonous yapping; her heart lifts incrementally at the sound. Underneath her scarf, she smiles. Nugget hasn’t been at Graham and Ryan’s for very long – this is her second day, in fact – so Yaz is an entirely new person to her.

She hopes Nugget will react well. Frankly, she can’t be bothered to put up with any sort of nuisance while they’re trying to save the world.

Ryan is already wrapped up, with lead and dog attached, as he opens the door. He keeps the door open long enough to allow Graham to wave a quick hello, but shuts it quick enough to keep the cold out. Nugget, russet-and-white underneath her blue doggy coat, bounds up and down the thin stone stairs, around Ryan’s legs, around Yaz’s legs, jumping up at her owner’s friend in barely-contained excitement, as Ryan locks the door. Yaz is too busy greeting the bundle of fun to acknowledge him turning around and gazing at her softly.

‘Saw the news,’ he starts.

Yaz straightens up and brushes her hands down her coat. ‘Yeah.’ Her voice is carefully flat. She will not let it dip.

She recalls there being a press conference in the hall, journalists clamouring to get a picture of the haggard officers confirming the death of a beloved friend.

‘I’m sorry.’ At first, Yaz thinks he is bowing his head, but then he reaches down to pat Nugget on the head, checking her over quickly. Nugget welcomes the attention. ‘Anyone you knew?’

‘Friend of mine,’ she responds. ‘Friend of everyone’s, really. Used to love patrolling with him.’ She tries to smile.

‘Must’ve been proper good, then,’ Ryan acknowledges, and Yaz laughs, a short, sharp thing.

‘He really was.’ She inhales, opening her mouth to speak, when Ryan continues on.

‘You don’t think it was the Limina, do you?’ Crouched down, he gives Nugget a scratch under her chin. Her eyes are closed, blissful.

Yaz shrugs. ‘I don’t know, we don’t have evidence,’ she says. ‘Forensic just say it was a car crash. Look, can we not talk about it right now? I’ve been bogged down it all day and –’ she breathes in ‘– I’m so tired.’

Ryan nods once.

She tries not to let her previous night’s paranoia resurface. All that fear about ghostly grasses and malevolent trees. But her shoulders are still tight, despite the weight of the day straining to push them down, and her multiple attempts to loosen them are made in vain. Something just felt so wrong that night. Something felt evil.

With Ryan ambling along with her, and Nugget plodding along, it is easier. Now and then, she will catch Nugget gazing up at her, tongue out, the little round tail wagging in a frenzy. The structure of her face, a little more relaxed than her shorter-nosed counterparts, naturally pulls her face into a smile. And when Nugget smiles, she grins. Yaz can understand why Ryan was immediately taken by her.

‘Thought it was going to take a little bit longer to get her,’ Yaz says, nodding down at little Nugget. She is currently sniffing curiously at the bottom of a lamppost. Yaz and Ryan quickly overtake, and Ryan has to pull on the lead gently to bring Nugget along.

Ryan grins. ‘Yeah, Graham got it sorted earlier as a bit of a surprise. Process was quite easy, apparently,’ he explains. ‘When he told me yesterday, I had to wait ’til NVQ had finished. Worst wait of my life, mate, for real.’

It brings out a smile in Yaz. If anyone was meant for Nugget, it’s him.

It leaves her with little to say. Ryan slips into a comfortable silence while Yaz searches for something, anything, to break it. Her mind goes round and round the same patterns, the very same topics she’s trying to avoid, and she curses herself. In her pockets, her fingers twitch.

The walk takes fifteen minutes to reach the edge of the fields. Where Yaz finds herself hesitating, Ryan ploughs on, Nugget yapping delightedly behind him. Such a tiny little thing, a fragile thing. If there’s anything evil here… Yaz shivers. She won’t go down that road. One foot in front of another, and eventually she catches up.

‘What made you come here last night?’ Ryan finally asks. He looks away quickly but wrestles his eyesight back onto her. ‘After Jane’s?’

Yaz swallows. Neither can she look at him for too long. While he waits for an answer, she hears her own heart pounding. Straining against the day. Hasn’t it done that enough today? Hasn’t she hurt enough today? Ryan is patient with her, and she is thankful for that.

‘Distraction,’ she responds, with one of those half-smiles she is getting far too used to using nowadays. Ryan frowns, a question sliding down the angle of his eyebrows, and Yaz clears her throat. ‘From Jane. That’s all.’ An edge has crept into her voice, an edge she didn’t want to unearth. So much for training. She can’t help but be open around her best friend.

That edge demands finality, demands moving on, but Ryan won’t. In the starlight, the shape of him becomes him: form giving meaning. The physicality of him is reassuring, especially against the backdrop of the night. ‘What did she do?’ he wonders. ‘If you don’t mind me asking.’

She does mind, but she can’t help but tell him something. Not the whole truth – but something. Damn Ryan, for being so good. Such a listener. A shoulder to cry on. She inhales, a tremble, but carries on. ‘She was just – there, Ryan. She was just being herself. And she looked up at me. And that was it.’ She sniffs. The cold and the lump in her throat, conniving, collaborating. Her voice thick with their scheming. ‘She was there and the Doctor wasn’t, and it – it _ hurt_.’ She watches Ryan hurt, all softness, and it squeezes her insides. ‘So the TARDIS was something else to think about. And then she wasn’t there, and I was alone.’ She looks down at Nugget, sniffing her legs. ‘I’m alone.’

‘But you’re not,’ Ryan attempts to reassure her. ‘You’ve got us. Even if the TARDIS ain’t here. Even if the Doctor ain’t.’

So easy for him to say, when he is not tethered to Jane the way she is.

She says nothing.

Ryan stops at the edge of the field, facing the copse of trees denoting the transition from open fields to a small patch of wilderness. That pull, the drawing in feeling, is strongest here. Even when the wind picks up and murmurs around them, it cannot drown out the tension. It dances on the hairs of her skin and fills the air rushing into her nose, a quiet electricity just different enough to be noticeable.

But they face nothing. Just the trees, that swing as one black, vague shape, singing with the wind of their disappointment.

The elements all around them, and still, nothing.

Nugget must feel the residual energy, too. She has taken up to barking, spinning in circles. Though that may be Nugget being Nugget, for all she knows. Yaz convinces herself of this until the puppy stops all of a sudden, her stocky legs braced and trembling with the tension. She stares straight forward, and yips twice.

Still, nothing.

‘Was definitely here yesterday,’ Ryan announces, a little pointlessly.

‘Well, it’s not yesterday, is it?’ Yaz responds sharply; she can’t help herself. ‘So a fat lot of good that is.’

‘Hey!’ Ryan protests.

‘I’m just saying.’ She crosses her arms. ‘What use is the TARDIS being here yesterday if it’s today? And why didn’t you go in?’

‘’Cause I was walking Nugget!’ he answers. ‘D’you think the Doctor would’ve appreciated muddy paw prints all over her ship?’ Frustratingly, he has a point. ‘D’you think the _ TARDIS _would appreciate that?’

‘No.’

‘Exactly.’ He huffs, and the breath billows out like smoke, a white ghost in night air. He stomps his feet down, startling Nugget a little, when he adds, ‘Not sure we should go in, anyway. You heard the Doctor about the TARDIS.’

She groans. ‘And we currently don’t have a better option. It’s all we have!’

‘And will you say that – when we get sucked out into God knows where – when the TARDIS don’t stay? How’s Graham gonna get us back and stabilised when we don’t even know _ when _it lands?’

‘He can use the sonic!’

Her shaking now comes not from the cold but from a burning, deep-set and unlocking. So much of her wants to yell, at Ryan, at the trees, at the TARDIS, at anything, at everything. Leave her to shout, for a whole day if she has to, and by the morning light there will be no Skye Edge upon which that bloody TARDIS can land.

‘How would he know to do that?’

‘Because he’s not stupid!’ Yaz sighs, short and hot. ‘We’d find a way. We always do.’

‘Yeah, with the Doctor with us,’ Ryan argues. ‘But she ain’t here, is she? So it’s just up to us. And none of us know how to pilot that ship.’ He shakes his head quickly, looking anywhere but at Yaz. ‘It ain’t what you want to hear, I know, but I really don’t think it’s the right—’

‘I _ know _ you don’t,’ Yaz snaps. ‘But it’s the only option we’ve _ got_, Ryan, how many times do I have to say it?’ She burns on, surprising even herself with the ferocity. ‘I feel like I’m the only one trying to figure out a way past the Limina but I’m getting nowhere. So all I do is talk to Jane and try not to _ cry_.’

Suddenly she can’t look at him. She manoeuvres herself around the ever-energetic dog at her feet, and turns back.

Her boots are heavy, her legs straining at their own weight. Bed calls, and she welcomes it. She welcomes the slip into nothingness, the empty promise that maybe, this time, she will wake up and find the past two days reset.

She’d like that. No trips to the empty fields, Tomasz safe and sound and Mikey _ alive_. No argument, no assembled dining table, no Jane gazing up at her like an angel. Nothing, nothingness, and more nothing.

The burning of it must make a trail in the night, residual heat left behind to lead Ryan back to her. When her boot dips onto gravel and pavement, her whereabouts illuminated in white LEDs by a nearby streetlight, he finally catches up with her, his slow jog turning swiftly into a halt. Nugget zips past, turning back in a big circle and clambering up Yaz’s legs.

‘Yaz!’ he calls, panting. ‘I’m sorry, mate.’ He pauses to beckon Nugget back to him. It takes three tries, but eventually the dog stops pestering Yaz. ‘I didn’t wanna argue.’

‘Right,’ she scoffs. But the trail of heat means some of the burning has been left behind. The more she walks, the more she cools.

‘I mean it, I promise,’ he tries. Sighing, he tries a different tactic. ‘I’m scared, too, yeah? I’m scared of what’s gonna go wrong. The Doctor ain’t here anymore and I’m scared that we can’t do stuff without her. I just wanna do right by her.’

That, after all, is why she’s sticking by it. Until another option comes, all they have is their limited information. When the Limina arrive, by the earliest in a month’s time, all they will have is the Doctor telling them to look after Jane.

They’ve survived many a predicament without nearly as much information as they’ve needed – but all those times, they had the Doctor leading them.

This is the way Yaz can be sure of her own leadership.

‘So do I,’ she agrees, grasping Ryan’s olive branch. Her gaze softens. ‘I’m sorry. Long day.’ Her inhale is like a gasp. ‘Awful day.’

Ryan nods, and extends an arm.

Yaz takes the invitation gratefully, wrapping her arms around his middle, letting his natural warmth envelope her. When she closes her eyes, she can see the sights of Sheffield below; the icy wind up on the rocks.

‘You’re not alone, Yaz,’ he murmurs above her head, and she wants to believe it.

* * *

_ ‘Hello?’ _comes the voice, reassuring in an instant.

Curled up on the sofa, her coat draped over her like a duvet, her small figure feels even smaller in the main room of her home. She has no idea where any of her family are, but she’ll take the peace and quiet while she can.

She’s talking to someone important, anyway.

‘Graham?’ she says into her phone, wincing at her monotonous her voice still is.

_ ‘Yaz!’ _ he chirps, and, briefly, it warms Yaz’s heart. _ ‘Blimey, wasn’t expecting a call from you. Weren’t you out with Ryan earlier?’ _

‘Yeah, yeah. I just – wanted to catch up with you, as well. See how you’re getting on.’

_ ‘Oh,’ _ he says, the surprise audibly colouring his response. _ ‘Well, you caught me at the right time, I’ve just come back from bowling.’ _

‘How’d it go?’

_ ‘Amazing, absolutely amazing. Actually came first. Getting really good at it, I’ll have you know.’ _ Sensing no response from Yaz, he continues on. _ ‘Been a couple times now with my bus driver mates, nice way of staying in touch – none of this WhatsUp malarkey, I can’t hack it, and there’s nothing better than being there in person.’ _

‘It’s WhatsApp, Graham, not WhatsUp,’ Yaz reminds him gently, adjusting her position on the sofa. She wonders if he’s being chatty because she’s not. Maybe not – she’s being too self-centred. He’s probably still buzzing from winning.

_ ‘Yeah, yeah, that one. Can’t bowl through WhatsApp, can you?’ _ It makes Yaz laugh. _ ‘Anyway, I’m about to go out again.’ _

‘You’re a busy man, aren’t you?’ she remarks.

_ ‘Have to be, Yaz. Keeps me vigilant. Even with this bloody dog rolling around my feet every ten minutes.’ _

‘She’s really cute, though.’

_ ‘Yeah, she is. Best decision I ever made. ’Cept Grace, of course.’ _

‘Of course,’ Yaz agrees warmly.

_ ‘So what did you phone for? Anything on your mind, petal?’ _

She looks down at her coat, the furred hood. How to phrase it all. She takes in as much air as she can, expelling it all in a sigh. ‘Everything. Did Ryan tell you about what happened at work today?’

_ ‘We saw on the telly, love. They put the news out ’round lunchtime, didn’t they? That’s not easy at the best of times. How’re you holding up?’ _

‘I’m not,’ she shrugs, and her laugh is bitter. ‘None of us are. He was friends with everyone. Just the loveliest man. My friend – Tomasz – he got away with his life, but it must have been an awful crash.’

_ ‘I’m really sorry to hear it,’ _ Graham repeats, with all the heaviness of death behind him. _ ‘And it was just a crash?’ _

She knows what he’s alluding to, though he’s being far too polite to say it out loud. Unlike Ryan. She swallows. ‘I don’t know, Graham. I wasn’t there, I can’t know. The Doctor said they won’t be here until next month, anyway.’

_ ‘Well, let’s pray for that, eh?’ _

‘I don’t want to think of the alternative,’ she admits, and quietly, quietly, it stokes her earlier burning. She hugs her arm tighter around herself. ‘If they’re already here then it leaves us defenceless. When Ryan and I went to Skye Edge earlier—’

_ ‘It wasn’t there, Ryan told me.’ _

‘No, exactly, it wasn’t. Which means all we have is what the Doctor’s told us. And no defences.’

_ ‘Nothing but improvisation,’ _ Graham interjects. _ ‘And we’ve escaped some slippery situations before on that, ain’t we?’ _

‘With the Doctor,’ Yaz reminds him. ‘Always with the Doctor.’

_ ‘So we do it our way, Yaz. Until we know the Limina are definitely here, we can concentrate on Jane. But we always learn on the adventure, don’t we? We’re not giving up hope yet. We’ll find something soon.’ _

Though he rushes through his words, her mind captures them and keeps them there, held on tightly. _ We’re not giving up hope yet. _It would be so easy to dismiss it, to end the call and let her legs lead her to bed. To wish for nothingness. And, in part, she still does.

Sunflowers and soft pillows. Her whole body cries for it.

But she is not there – not yet. And some part of her does still have some hope, clinging onto her heart desperately, even as grief tears into it with teeth like needles. Not a product of travelling with the Doctor but a product of being _ herself_. She will look out for it, when everything around her collapses.

Why else is she still friends with Jane? Not self-flagellation, she hopes.

It’s what it means to be human, she knows. It’s what it means to be herself.

So she grabs onto it.

_ ‘I’ve gotta go now, accompanying Terry on one of his alien sightings. His usual mate pulled out so I’m a backup. Think I’m his only backup, come to think of it.’ _

Yaz laughs. ‘He could have much worse backup.’

_ ‘Oh, you’re just buttering me up now, ain’t you?’ _

Yaz closes the goodbyes with a promise that if Graham needs her, he’s got her phone number. Just because she’s not on duty, it doesn’t mean she can’t help. They end the call, and Yaz locks her screen. Only now, with the time pushing ten o’clock, is she the happiest she’s been all day.

Even so, she can feel it bubbling up – the burning, the grief. And the hope, too. She’d needed that. A month, just about, and she’s still in the worst of it.

But they’ve got a little bit of hope.

Sunflowers and soft pillows feel temporary now. Wrapping around her ache, a sense of soothing. She looks forward not to the nothingness but the healing that will bring. Out of everything, she thinks, she will need the healing the most.

No point wishing for a resurrection. But healing, she can do.

With an eight a.m. shift tomorrow, it is better she succumbs to the healing sooner rather than later. She can wake, refreshed, and try again. The lights are off in the corridor leading to her bedroom, and she glides in darkness. Where the sonic sits, sunflowers beckon.

Just before she edges into her bedroom, she detects another presence hovering behind her. Whipping round, her heart suddenly in her ears, her eyes search for an intruder. The telltale sound of wind, or grasses grasping at her boots.

But it’s nothing. Just Sonya returning to her own room. Yaz doubts she even realised her older sister was there too. Her heart rate settles, but she locks her bedroom door just to be safe.

Right. Sunflowers. Safety. Safety.

The warmth of Graham’s reassurance is a gentle encouragement, and the few moments of fleeting happiness – Nugget bouncing around her feet, Ryan’s hug – play on a loop as her mind processes, settles.

The last thing on her mind, before she falls asleep, feels so far back now. More surreal than real life could ever be. It is the distant planet, the echoes of a ravaging burning around them. Terror would eclipse everything, before and after, but in this moment all Yaz remembers is the way the Doctor held her hand.

Warmth, and a grateful, graceful life, burning through the both of them. Just from the way the Doctor held her hand.

She lets the feel of it take her into sleep.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> today i learned that my [faceclaim for maisie](https://strange-seas-fanfic.tumblr.com/characters), jo woodcock, is technically part of the doctor who extended universe as she's been in a big finish doctor who production!! and she's already acted alongside jodie in tess of the d'urbervilles! the uk really does only have ten actors!!
> 
> also it's only three days til s12 which is absolutely _wild,_ folks. how did we survive a whole year! where did that year go! what the fuck!


	10. ten: doc_vlog_2.mp4

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _something in your reflection  
helps me understand  
which way i should turn from here_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> here's the second chapter of the week! chapter eleven should be up on saturday - fingers crossed! 
> 
> i'm love ryan sinclair, he's such a chatterbox when he's on his own. also nugget is my _favourite_ dog ever and no i will not take any criticism. she's just so mad
> 
> for this chapter, i'd recommend the delightful ['lighthouse'](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xJl71CHY-6Q) by axel flóvent!

‘’Kay, we’re on right?’ Ryan peers at the screen, then nods to himself. ‘Off we go then!’ he chirps.

‘So, it’s – it’s April thirteenth? Fourteenth? Yeah, fourteenth of April, and we’ve been back on Earth for two months now. Can barely believe it to be honest. Time flies, even down on Earth. Bet you wouldn’t agree with me, would you? Time’s so different when you’re travelling.’ He clears his throat, and runs a hand down his jaw. He has a beard emerging, complete with moustache. ‘It was so weird, like at first every day was so damn slow, but… Two months is a long time, I guess. I guess we got used to it.

‘And it was hard at first. I mean – wait, I’ve told you all this before, right? In the last one.’ He laughs at himself. ‘Just so you know I’m not editing any of this. Too much to edit, what with my Let’s Play Videos, and also it feels – like, natural. Candid, y’know. Like you’re really here. Wish you were, but this is the best I’ve got, so…’ He looks away, and his shrug signifies the end of his sentence. He crosses his arms.

He looks back at the camera. ‘Actually it’s kinda difficult to say all that’s happened in the last two months ’cause that’s a long time, right?’ He frowns. ‘So I’m sorry for not doing this earlier, Doctor. I got caught up in it all. There’s been so much goin’ on that it’s been difficult to find time to film in it.

‘Like – I’ve got three different places I switch around, right? Got my shifts at the warehouse, and when I’m there it’s bl—proper exhausting. Then I got NVQ class, and that’s just a waste of time sometimes, y’know. And I’ve got the garage as well, and it’s my highlight of the week to be fair. Then in between all that I got puppy training and gym and my Let’s Play and _ then _—’ he takes an exaggerated breath ‘— I got my own downtime.’ His eyebrows raise. ‘Whoa. Didn’t actually realise how busy I am to be honest. Huh.

‘And then in all that time we’re s’posed to be lookin’ out for Jane as well.’ He flings out his hands. ‘And it’s like, can I? I ain’t even met her yet. After, like, two months!

‘I mean, Yaz has, quite a lot. They text all the time, she and Jane. They’re – they’re friends now. Yeah. Friends, definitely. Back, like, a month ago, Yaz helped Jane assemble a dining table, then they watched _ Game of Thrones_. Jane really likes _ Game of Thrones_, apparently.

‘They actually do binge nights now, believe it or not. Straight up just _ Game of Thrones_, all night.’ Ryan puts on a high-pitched voice, to badly impersonate Yaz. ‘“Ryan, it’s _ Game of Thrones _ and Schloer and wine!”’ Back to his normal voice, he continues, ‘The _ amount _ of times she’s said that to me now, mate. It’s always that. Dunno what she’s trying to prove. That they have refreshments? That they’re being proper adulty? Who knows, mate, who knows.’ He pauses. ‘All I know is I’ve said that show’s name _ far _ too much and I bet you don’t even know it.’ He frowns. ‘Actually. If you know Ed Sheeran then you probably know _ GoT_.’ Looking to the camera, he wonders, ‘Did you know Ed Sheeran was on that? Bet you’d love to see that. Just ask Yaz, she’ll happily do that.

‘Or maybe it would remind her too much of Jane. I dunno.

‘It’s a weird thing for her. Don’t think it stopped being weird for her, don’t think it ever will. ’Cause with that sonic screwdriver and that USB, you pretty much put her in charge of this whole thing, and she’s tryin’ her best. She’s the one who befriended Jane, and she’s the one who’s constantly looking on them alien conspiracy sites – the actually good ones that saw the Dalek and everythin’ – and, mate, trust me, there are some proper awful ones on the internet. Ugh.’ He scratches his cheek. ‘Anyway, got sidetracked. She’s the one tryna look after us all while we wait for them Limina to come. Jane, especially.

‘And from what I hear, Jane’s actually decent. Nothin’ like you, Doctor. She ain’t got your energy – no one does, really, do they? But she’s alright. Funny. Casual. Into her jazz.

‘And Yaz says she’s lonely. Makes me wonder what the rest of her life is like, outside of Yaz. ’Cause from the sounds of it, she has a laugh with her, and then when Yaz leaves it’s just her nine to five, her job, and her house. Her house that got _ burgled_, as well.’ His eyebrows rise again at the revelation. ‘Forgot to mention that one. Some moron full-on threw a brick at her window and nicked her telly. That was how Yaz finally found her, actually; she got called in. Absolutely mad to be honest.’ He shakes his head in wonder.

‘This last month has been a bit quiet, really. But for the first month, it was just us panickin’ about not being able to find Jane, tryna settle in. And getting used to that, y’know. One of my mates kicked off about me not always being there, feelin’ left out and all that. He blamed it on _ Cas _of all people, ’cause he saw we were close and decided we were boyfriends now, which —’ Ryan makes an incredulous sound. ‘We’re not – we’re nowhere near that – we’re not – we’re not together – and even if we were, then it ain’t Cas’ fault. He had nothin’ to do with it. I hated that to be honest, that Kya was so quick to point the finger at Cas. Cas is many things, definitely, but he ain’t a snake like that. He just wouldn’t do that. He’s a proper gent, y’know? He’s such a good guy. So much shit has happened to him and he comes out on top despite it all. Always.’ He pauses, distracted. When he comes to, he has to shake his head to force himself into the present. ‘So I dropped Kya pretty quick after that.

‘And, like, it was all us tryna get a grip on everythin’ – ’cause what would happen if the Limina arrived and we weren’t prepared? Yaz was goin’ out her mind with that stress, ’cause she’s sorta the leader of us all now, and I s’pose she feels responsible for everyone. Like, the whole world, keepin’ it safe from the Limina.

‘I told you this before, but she kept tryna find the TARDIS. ‘We know where it is, now, but we don’t quite know when it appears. Best guess is once a week. Yaz has her shifts and her time with Jane, and I’m busy, that it’s hard to try and keep track.

‘Graham’s our best bet, I know, but he keeps himself busy as well. Doesn’t wanna dwell. Didn’t wanna dwell with Nan, and doesn’t wanna stop moving now. Makes sense, don’t it?’ He shrugs. ‘So he does a lot with charity. He’s started volunteering at the food bank in the last...week? Two weeks? And he goes bowling with his mates. He’s got a talent, for sure.

‘So, Doctor, when you’re _ finally _back and you take us out to bowling, just be prepared. He’s gonna absolutely smash us all. I’ve made my peace with being destroyed by my granddad but I dunno if you and Yaz will. I can’t wait to be honest.’ Ryan’s grin is flecked with glee.

‘Oh!’ he clicks his fingers as the thought pops up. ‘And he also goes out on alien hunting nights with his mate Nutty Terry. Yaz always says she’s on standby if he needs anything but, honestly, Doctor, Terry is a bit of a weirdo. I know they were bus driver mates but _ still_. He proper believes that them little green men exist and that he’ll be the one to find ’em. Dunno why he bothers, and I dunno why Graham goes with him most times. He always complains after.’ He frowns at himself. From within the house, a barking starts. It gets louder and louder as Nugget bounds up the stairs. ‘Though he might just stumble across the Limina and then we’ll have to rescue him from them and figure out what on Earth’s goin’ on.

‘Bet you anything that’ll happen,’ he adds, though he doesn’t look particularly pleased.

‘It kinda makes sense though, don’t it? If Nutty Terry’s actually right then he’ll be our first defence. And Graham keeps goin’ on about “the Doctor way” – figurin’ it all out with improvisation and plungin’ ourselves into the deep end. I’m still thinkin’ we’ll get out of this another way, like, something’ll crop up, but Yaz says Nutty Terry’s useful to us at least.

‘For now we just keep lookin’ at those sites for anything resembling them Limina. I look at Twitter, and Snapchat, and stuff like that. Just doin’ what I can, y’know. It makes Yaz feel better.

‘But life gets in the way, too, and sometimes I’ll have to explain to Cas why I’m scrolling through alien shit on my feed and I hate it to be honest. I hate lying in general, but, like, I hate lying to Cas especially, and Yaz, and Graham. It makes me dread gettin’ to know Jane, ’cause her whole _ life’s _a lie. And how do you justify that?

‘I can’t imagine how Yaz feels,’ he murmurs, shaking his head. ‘She’s doing you a solid, you know. She’d pretty much do anythin’ for you, Doctor, and if this don’t prove it then nothin’ will.

‘She’s been having the roughest time of it, definitely. It’s been a month now, but one of her colleagues got killed, one of her favourites. And one of her work friends was in that crash. Think he’s alright now, just recovering from his injuries, but it’s pretty awful, right? All the media say it’s a tragedy come at a tough time for the Force, what with cuts and that, and it puts people off, y’know: they think he was speeding.

‘Yaz says they didn’t find anything wrong with the car; they wrote it off as losing control – and I guess it does happen sometimes – but I do still wonder if the Limina were part of it. Nothin’ any of ’em say allude to that – but it gets me thinking. S’pose now we know they’re out there, I always will. It’s paranoia, and I’m not about that, but just ’cause we can’t find them doesn’t mean they’re not there.’

He gets distracted by a succession of louder yips as Nugget pelts into the room. ‘You shouldn’t be up here!’ But he laughs, and hauls her stout body onto his lap. Delighted by being allowed into Ryan’s room, she yips twice more, barely paying attention to anything but Ryan. Eagerly, she starts licking at his chin, making him laugh.

‘Oh, yeah,’ he says to the camera, ‘this is our new dog, Nugget, by the way. Nugget, say hi to the Doctor!’ He takes Nugget’s paw and waves it in the general direction of the camera. Nugget acknowledges the camera apparatus but seems far more preoccupied with getting comfy on Ryan’s lap.

‘Please tell me you allow dogs on the TARDIS,’ Ryan says. Both of his hands pet Nugget while he focuses the rest of his attention on the camera. ‘She’s a good dog, honest. Well trained; me and Granddad are makin’ sure of that.’

Nugget whines, but she resumes panting contentedly when Ryan plants a kiss on the top of her head.

‘I’m scared the Limina’s gonna get her in the coming months,’ he admits. ‘The Limina sound ruthless and I bet they won’t mind gettin’ a dog out the way. Nugget don’t deserve that.

‘To be truthful I’m scared of a lot of things. That we can’t figure out what they’re doin’ in time. That we can’t save people. That we’re gonna fail you. You’ve given us a mammoth task, Doctor, and this is when it all starts, really. I know Yaz is right, that we ain’t prepared, and it keeps me awake sometimes. You’d know what to do, but we don’t, not yet. And we miss you, Doctor, we really do.’

I love life back at home but we still miss you.’ Ryan rubs at his neck. ‘I do it ’cause of you, a bit.’ He frowns. ‘I wanna be someone you’re proud of – inside and outside the TARDIS. I’m tryna do right by you, as well as do right by myself. I s’pose that means settlin’ back into life at home but it also means being ready for whatever the Limina are gonna throw at us.

‘Honestly, Doctor, I just hope we can make you proud. Give you a family to come back to, y’know.’

Nugget woofs gently. Ryan looks down at her quickly.

‘You’re right, Nugget, I _ am _bein’ soppy.’ He looks back up at the camera, sheepish. ‘Sorry,’ though there is no note of apology in his voice. ‘I’ll come back to this another time, yeah? Hopefully not in almost two months’ time. I promise I won’t make it that long again.’ He swallows. ‘It’s nice to talk to you, Doctor. And – yeah, speak again soon.’

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> you thought these chapters had plot? _now_ the plot's comin folks
> 
> it's almost new year's, so i'd like to wish you all a happy new year, folks! and if you don't celebrate the western new year, then have a happy day anyway!! i'm really looking forward to 2020 - it signifies the next chapter of my life; i'll be graduating uni, turning 21, properly entering the world of work, and (fingers crossed) i will be doing _lots_ of writing - so i'm feeling hopeful. despite all the odds. i wish for you to have such hope, that things will turn out okay in the end.
> 
> also, new years is the premiere of series 12, which is absolutely _bonkers_ and wonderful. please please _please_ yell with/at me about series 12 in the comments, or on any of my social medias (may i suggest tardis-sapphics) because i really love chatting about this barmy little show!! and i love you readers!! and, lastly, enjoy the episode!

**Author's Note:**

> please follow the [strange seas blog](strange-seas-fanfic.tumblr.com) for updates! thank you so much for reading!


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